


Opportunity Knocks

by nikkiRA



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: Groundhog Day AU, Lame title because i am a lame person, M/M, aka nico keeps living the same day over and over because the gods hate him
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-10
Updated: 2016-03-13
Packaged: 2018-05-13 02:14:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 35,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5690698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nikkiRA/pseuds/nikkiRA
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two years after the war with Gaia, Nico tries to run away again, but on the way he is ambushed by Aphrodite, who has decided to take a personal interest in him - lucky him. Nico finds himself stuck in a Groundhog Day situation, reliving the same day over and over until he can figure out what the hell Aphrodite wants from him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> HELLO FRIENDS I am here again
> 
> Now I guess this is technically based on the Bill Murray movie Groundhog Day which I watched like literally probably ten years ago and have not seen it since, but this is actually an idea I got after reading this great Drarry fic [Tea and No Sympathy](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2734082/chapters/6126311) which honestly if you're a Drarry fan read it it's fantastic

He isn’t sure who to blame more – the gods, or Will fucking Solace.

He decides on Will Solace. He can’t punch a god, after all. He could probably get away with punching Will Solace.

But really, it was just like the gods, wasn’t it? To completely and utterly overreact like this. To fuck around with the whole goddamn world just to spite one person. It’s like they didn’t even care. Which, of course, they didn’t. The gods didn’t care about anything but themselves. Everything else was entertainment.

Will Solace, on the other hand, should have known better. What, exactly, he should have known, Nico wasn’t sure. All he knew was that Will Solace was right at the heart of this whole fiasco. Will Solace, the gods, and him. And he was innocent. A bystander. A victim, even.

Will fucking Solace!

* * *

It started when he was cornered. Ambushed, really. All while taking a totally innocent stroll in the forest.

Okay, so the rucksack full of his things wasn’t exactly innocent, but he had tried, okay? He had done his goddamn best. He had put his best effort in, honestly, which is more than he had ever imagined himself doing. So what if he was admitting defeat now? He tried. He really can’t make that clear enough. He _tried._

Apparently that was not enough for the gods. Nothing was _ever_ enough for the gods.

It was his own damn fault. He had gotten too sentimental for his own good. He couldn’t just shadow travel out of his own fucking cabin. That had seemed too… rude. Too disrespectful. That was the word. Disrespectful. Disrespectful to what, or who, he wasn’t really sure, but he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t ditch straight from his cabin.

So he traipsed out to the forest, and that’s when everything fell to shit.

“Lady Aphrodite,” he said, with a tone that indicated what he really meant was _fuck off,_ with the slightest nod of his head. That was the first indication that this was really, really bad.

Next to her was a tall, beautiful young man with, strangely, only one lock of hair. Not a look Nico would have been able to pull off, but it worked for him. There were wings on his feet, like Hermes, and he was holding a very sharp razor, with which he appeared to be cleaning his fingernails. He looked up at Nico when he spoke, and Nico wasn’t sure which one of them he should be more afraid of.

“Lord Caerus.”

The god looks momentarily surprised, and Nico knew he was unwillingly impressed. “Not many know of me.”

“Caerus. Son of Zeus. God of opportunity. Your card allowed the holder to either escape an attack or steal an item from the opponent. Mythomagic,” he adds at the incredulous looks he is given. Aphrodite rolls her eyes. “What do you want?”

Aphrodite scowls, marring her pretty face. “You have been given too much leeway by the gods, Nico di Angelo. You have forgotten to be afraid.”

“I just figured if you were here to kill me you would have done so by now.” Also it was unlikely that of all the gods who were finally going to get annoyed enough to send him on a permanent vacation to his father, it wouldn’t be the goddess of love.

“I never really liked you,” Aphrodite mutters. The feeling is mutual, although Nico is wise enough not to mention this. He eyes the other god, who stares back at him.

“You are wondering about the hair,” he says. He doesn’t like the way Caerus is looking at him. He vaguely remembers somewhere deep inside of him that Caerus was sometimes considered a demon. Something about drinking blood. He decides not to focus on that.

“Opportunity can only be seized from the front. Once I pass, there is nothing to grab. The moment has been lost.”

Nico debates saying something about firing his barber, but he’s still thinking about that blood drinking thing, so he stays quiet.

“You still haven’t told me what you’re doing here.”

“Why don’t you start?” Aphrodite says accusingly. Nico shifts from foot to foot.

“All due respect, ma’am,” he says, in a voice that very clearly says he means no respect whatsoever, “I fail to see what this has to do with me. If I recall, you just said you didn’t even like me.”

“I have taken a… personal interest in you, Nico di Angelo. I do not have to like you to do so. Don’t give me that look,” she says, at the utter horror that undoubtedly crosses his face. “There has been peace for two years. I need something to do.”

“I don’t need any more love gods meddling in my life,” he says coldly. Aphrodite actually looks at him with some kind of kindness.

“The gods had no say in your sexuality,” she says, as softly as a goddess can. “Although, really, you’re _Greek!_ Surely you’ve heard the stories.”

Nico blushes brightly. “I’m Italian,” he mutters. Aphrodite ignores this.

“The only thing Eros ever did was force you to face a part of you that you were hiding. You might never have admitted it otherwise.”

“He had no right. It was my business.”

“Love is our job. It is entirely our business.” Nico goes to say something else, but Aphrodite quickly speaks again. “If I recall, you wanted to know why we are here?”

Nico nods grudgingly. He is looking at Aphrodite, but it is Caerus who speaks.

“What do you know of time, Nico di Angelo?”

There are so many possible retorts to this question that Nico is momentarily overwhelmed. Eventually he settles with, “It passes.”

“Forwards,” Caerus says. Nico smells a trap, so he stays quiet.

If he had been annoyed before, he was bordering on murderous now. He had purposely left very late in the night – so late it was early – when he knew absolutely no one would be awake, shortly before dawn when the camp was quiet and the harpies were starting to get lazy. But the two gods had kept him here a long time, and he knows for a fact that Will woke with the sun, and Jason, probably because of his godforsaken Roman training, not long after, and he can see a faint hint of pink in the sky.

“What do you know of Kairos?” Caerus asks.

“Probably significantly less than you do,” he says drily.

“I don’t doubt it. The Greeks had two concepts of time – Chronos was the quantitative time. The minutes passing. But Kairos is different. Kairos represents moments, a qualitative moment of happening. It is possibility. It is an opening. It is _opportunity.”_ This last word he says slowly, relishing each syllable.

“Okay.” While he can’t deny that’s kind of cool, he doesn’t really know why he is being told this.

“I am telling you think simply to aid in your understanding,” the god says, as if he had read his mind.

“Oh that’s great, I’m really getting the point of all this.”

“You should be honoured, Nico. I don’t take a personal interest in just anyone, you know.”

“Percy told me all about your personal interest.”

Aphrodite’s face brightens at the mention of Percy. “Do you and Percy talk much? Are you friends?”

He gives her his best glare. “Okay, I’m done with this. I’m leaving now.”

“You still believe it will be as easy as that?” This is Caerus again. Nico sighs.

“Why do you _care?”_

“I don’t,” he says. “But she does. And Aphrodite is a very persuasive woman.”

“Fine, then why do _you_ care?”

“Would you believe that I only want what’s best for you?”

“Not even remotely.”

“Well I do. But I can’t be blamed if I want to have a bit of fun, first.”

Nico has a funny feeling that Aphrodite’s idea of fun is drastically different from Nico’s. He casts an anxious look at the brightening sky. “Look, I really have to go. I wanted to be out of here by day break.”

“You won’t see the break of this day in a long time. Not unless you are a very fast learner.”

He lets out a groan of frustration. “What does THAT mean?”

Caerus leans in close to him. “Opportunity is knocking, Mr. di Angelo. Let’s see if you can get to the door.”

Nico is about to respond to this when the sun breaks through the horizon. There is an uncomfortable feeling in the pit of his stomach, and then he is lurched to his feet as everything goes black.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a few chapters written already but not too many so like........if you read with the lights on updates likely won't be as quick as it was for that whoops
> 
> anyway once again i have a [tumblr](http://aravenlikeawritingdesk.tumblr.com/) hmu if you want to talk I also do take wtlo prompts if anyone is still so inclined and i just like friends!!!
> 
> also all of the caerus/kairos stuff is from a few websites (read: wikipedia) so if you have like, a really extensive knowledge of mythology and everything here is wrong just, like......shhhhhh


	2. Chapter 2

To say he was annoyed to end up back in his cabin would be an understatement. He was so angry he knocked a lamp off the wall, although he felt quite foolish afterwards.

So he can’t leave until tonight. Big fucking deal. They couldn’t keep him forever.

If pressed to explain why he wanted to leave, he couldn’t really put it into words. After two years, anyone you asked would have said that yeah, Nico di Angelo was a little weird, but he had a spot in the camp that he seemed to fit in well.

But there was just something, something deep inside him that had been stirring for a while, and he couldn’t seem to quiet it, no matter what he tried. It was a voice that kept whispering to him, telling him that Nico di Angelo was not somebody meant to stay in one place for this long. Nico di Angelo has been wandering the shadows since he was ten years old. It had nothing to do with being a son of Hades. It had to do with him.

Plus there was the awkward fact that yesterday he had tried to kiss Will Solace, who had turned very red and had muttered about having to return to the infirmary and had leapt away from Nico so quickly it was like he had learned to shadow travel. That had been the final push. Nico had packed his bag, determined to leave that night, because that voice had started whispering awful things, things he couldn’t help but agree with. Things like _what was the point of staying?_ _Will doesn’t want you. No one wants you._

The thing was – and this was the strange things – he had been _so fucking sure_ that Will had felt the same. Granted, Nico wasn’t really the best at this stuff, half because he was him, half because he been born in the 19 fucking 30s, but that had been why he had been so sure, because if he was picking up on it, surely it must be obvious?

Jason had thought so too, and had urged Nico to talk to Piper, but Nico wasn’t eager to let anyone else in on his humiliation.

But fine, the gods had to fuck things up, just like always. He’ll just have to ignore Will today and then set off again tonight. It will probably be too much to expect to be able to spend the day in his cabin, not with Jason and Percy, but it shouldn’t be too hard to avoid Will. Very likely, Will was probably going to be avoiding him too.

There is a knock on the door. It’s probably Jason. It’s usually Jason, except when it’s Will, and it’s probably not going to be Will.

Sure enough Jason is there when he opens the door. 

“Sup, dude?” Nico grimaces.

“I told you to stop hanging around Percy so much. You’re sounding more and more like a surfer every day.”

“You never told me that,” Jason replies defensively, sounding slightly offended. Nico rolls his eyes.

“I told you yesterday.”

“You went to breakfast with Will yesterday.”

“No, that was – never mind.” Jason’s gotten his days mixed up, but now they’ve gotten on the subject of Will much sooner than he had wanted. He waits for Jason to say something, but nothing comes; he isn’t sure if this is more annoying or relieving, but he decides not to push.

Percy is already at breakfast when they get there, so they take a seat next to him at the Poseidon table. Chiron had gotten much laxer about the seating ever since the war with Gaia and the influence of the Romans, especially to those who were alone in their cabins. Percy is already half way through what was probably an impressive, artery clogging stack of pancakes. He nods at them around a mouthful of food.

“Can I be on your team for Capture the Flag?” He asks once he’s swallowed. “Annabeth is angry at me.”

Nico is only half listening, so all he really retains is that last part, so he rolls his eyes.

“What did you do now?” Jason asks, looking amused.

“You know how me and Piper have that prank war going on, right? Well I may have sacrificed Annabeth in the name of the greater good.”

“How?”

“Toilet water.” He says. Jason grimaces. Nico, on the other hand, has finally clued in on what they’ve been saying.

“You did that yesterday. And why are we playing Capture the Flag again? We never do that.”

Both Percy and Jason are looking at him funny. Jason even goes so far to put his hand on Nico’s forehead, as if checking for fever.

“Are you all right?”

“Of course I’m all right, you two are the ones acting weird.”

“Maybe you should go to the infirmary.”

Nico stares at Jason in disbelief. “That’s not funny.”

“I’m not trying to be funny, I think you’re losing it.”

“You know I can’t go to the infirmary,” he hisses. He’s not too eager for Percy to hear what happened – there’s something off putting about discussing your love life with the guy you liked for four years.

“Why not?” Jason asks, woefully ignorant. “Did you and Will fight?” He has the sense to lower his voice, but he is still looking at Nico at confusion.

“Are you serious?” But instead of being angry, he’s genuinely worried. Jason would never jerk him around like this.

He stands up. “I have to go,” he says, hurrying off.

“Wait!” Percy yells after him. “What about Capture the Flag?”

“I’ll meet you there!”

He is thinking hard on the way to the infirmary. The day had started out exactly the way yesterday had, and he was starting to get really freaked out. He thinks back to what Aphrodite and Caerus had said, and that whole time thing. But there’s no way they would have that much control, is there? No matter what they said about qualitative moments, love and opportunity couldn’t be strong enough to change the rules of time, could they? And even if they were, there’s no way they would do it for Nico di Angelo.

He opens the door to the infirmary. There’s really only one way to find out.

Will is deep in conversation with one of his siblings, but he looks up when the door opens. His eyes narrow when he sees Nico.

“What did you do to yourself?”

“Nice to see you too, Solace. I didn’t do anything, I’m fine.” Will reaches out a hand but Nico slaps it away. “I said I’m fine! I wish people would stop trying to feel my fucking forehead.” But even as he’s saying this, a complicated jumble of emotions is happening inside him. Because Will is acting totally normal. There’s no way he could just be pretending nothing happened – Will sucked at pretending. Last year he had picked Nico for Secret Santa and Nico figured it out ten minutes after the fact.

That means it’s still today. Or yesterday. It’s still July 22nd, anyway.

_Which means he hasn’t tried to kiss Will yet._

He’s unsure how to feel about this. On the one hand, this is great – he hasn’t tried to kiss Will! Things won’t be weird or awkward or anything. And now he knows Will doesn’t feel the same, he’ll never embarrass himself like that again. But on the other hand, he really shouldn’t condone the gods meddling in his life like this.

But, he thinks, as Will smiles at him, it’s already happened. He might as well make the most of the situation.

“Are you sure you’re okay? You look strangely happy.”

“Am I not allowed to just be happy?” Will makes a disbelieving noise and Nico concedes that this is probably not the thing to say to try and convince people that he’s all right. “Yeah, okay. I’m just… excited for Capture the Flag.” Will looks like he doesn’t quite believe this either, but he seems to accept it, although he does narrow his eyes as if he’s trying to see through Nico.

He isn’t entirely sure why the gods let him do this day over, and it probably isn’t going to turn out as nicely as he’s expecting, but he can at least try to make the most of it for now.

“Well you shouldn’t be,” Will says savagely. “Especially now. Annabeth is out for blood. You have no chance against her.”

“We’ll see,” he says.

“Big words, di Angelo. Can you measure up?”

Nico opens his mouth to say something, but he shuts it. He has to stop this. He has to pull back. Will’s not interested.

“I should go find Jason,” he says, turning away. Will’s face falls.

“Okay. See you later.”

Nico almost runs.

* * *

“So who’s on guard? Not fucking Clovis again, that’s for sure.”

“I said I was sorry!”

“We can just set up traps.”

“It should be someone not attracted to women.”

“Why?”

“Piper and Drew walked the goddamn flag out of our camp last time.”

“Stop looking at me like that, Jason, I’m not doing it! Put Nyssa on it.”

Nyssa smirks. “I’m afraid I’m slightly more susceptible to charmspeak than you might think.” Chiron had banned Jason’s flight and Nico’s shadow travel from Capture the Flag, but charmspeak was still free game.

Nico swears. He doesn’t know why he’s arguing. He’s been through this. He knows how it’s supposed to go down. It’s probably just that he’s still annoyed. None of the Ares cabin would deign to take guard duty, most of the guys couldn’t, and everyone else has set jobs; the Hephaestus cabin is set up elsewhere, doing complicated things with complicated things. Not that it was going to matter much; Piper and Drew don’t get anywhere near them. The Ares cabin leads a diversion that involves a whole lot of angry yelling, the Hephaestus traps work seamlessly, and Percy and Jason sneak past the unsuspecting guard (Demeter girls, _really)_ with ease.

Too much ease, actually. It’s a record time, and no one on the other side – including Chiron – was happy with it. There had been talk of limiting the involvement of children of the Big Three.

“Fine, I’ll take guard duty. But I think we should go slower. I’m talking to you two, mainly,” he says, looking meaningfully at Percy and Jason. “Take it easy. If we win too quickly people might start to resent us. Chiron’s already limited the powers we can use.”

Percy points at him. “That’s why we keep you around.”

“Gee, thanks.”

“Can you handle guard duty on your own?”

Originally he had said no, and he had dealt with a very awkward girl from the Iris cabin who kept trying to make small talk.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine.”

They disperse. Nico yawns and takes a seat with his back against a tree. He wonders if he’ll have changed the game now that he had told Jason and Percy to slow down. He concentrates and pulls two skeletons out of the ground.

“Keep watch. Don’t hurt anyone, just let me know if anyone comes.”

He leans his head back and closes his eyes. So the day reset, clearly. He’s not really sure why. Aphrodite said she was bored. Maybe that’s all there was to it.

This is a false sense of security if there ever was one.

A few minutes later he hears rustling and one of his skeletons comes back. He shifts up, drawing his sword, mentally making a note of a couple of dull rocks around him. A few moments later, Piper and Drew stroll into the area.

No one knows what happened after the war. Not even the rest of the Aphrodite cabin knows. All anyone knows is that Drew and Piper had made peace, and they were a goddamn force to be reckoned with.

“Hello, Nico,” Piper says with a smile. Drew ignores him.

“Where are the other guards?”

“I’m the only one.”

Drew gives him a look. “That’s stupid.” He just shrugs. Drew narrows her eyes.

“Why did they leave you to do it alone?”

“Charmspeak.”

Drew purses her lips, and Piper nods. “Smart. But we had a backup plan for that.”

“Do you? That’s interesting.” He isn’t really paying much attention to what he’s saying; he’s trying to distract them. Piper is standing on a rock that would take too much energy to try and move, but the ground around Drew seems easy to control, and if he concentrates –

“Yes, I think so too.”

He spins around. Will Solace is perched on a tree, an arrow pointed at him, while Lou Ellen and Cecil are standing around the flag.

“Hey Sunshine,” Will says with a wink. Nico tells himself there’s no reason for this to be awkward. Will doesn’t remember Nico trying to kiss him. Probably because Nico hasn’t done it yet. Not that he’s going to.

“This would be a lot more intimidating if I had any faith in your aim, Solace.” Okay, Jason and Percy have stalled enough. He could probably take all five of them at once – four, really, since Drew wasn’t a fighter – but he’s not eager to. Especially not Lou Ellen. Magic intimidates him.

“We’ll be taking this,” Lou Ellen says. He still isn’t sure, even after two years, how he feels about Lou Ellen. She seems nice enough, but he’s kind of afraid of her. She gives off the vibe that she can read minds, and Nico would prefer his mind unread, especially since he’s half in love with her best friend.

He sinks Drew, who shrieks. She poses no threat, whatsoever, but every other person swings around to look, including Will, which means Nico is no longer under threat.

He’s not allowed to shadow travel, but he’s still fast. He grabs the flag out of Lou Ellen’s hand, calling out for those guards he had set up. Cecil had just turned back towards him when a horn sounds.

“Fuck,” Lou Ellen mutters. Will scowls and throws an arrow at him.

“Get me out of here, di Angelo!” Drew shrieks. Nico rolls his eyes and sends the dirt away. Drew grabs Piper’s hand to hoist herself out and glares furiously at Nico.

“A little dirt won’t kill you, Drew.”

Drew gives him another angry look and storms away. Piper smiles at him. “Next time,” she says, before following after Drew.

He picks up Will’s arrow and hands it back to him, smirking at his angry look.

“Bull shit.”

“Losing doesn’t look good on you, Solace.”

Suddenly Jason and Percy come bounding into the area and whooping. “Champions!” Percy shouts, high-fiving him rather violently. “How was guard duty?”

“I buried Drew in dirt.”

Jason gets a wistful look in his eyes. “Wish I could have seen that.” At that point Percy notices Will.

“Sorry for your loss, Solace,” he says, sounding not at all sorry, grinning lopsidedly at him. Will just glares.

“Celebrate all you want, Annabeth is still mad at you.”

Jason laughs, Percy pales, and Will winks at Nico, who turns red and turns away. _He’s just being friendly. Stop it reading into things._

Suddenly feeling not at all happy about their win anymore, Nico sets off back towards camp, while Percy and Will trash talk behind him. He can feel Jason’s eyes on him, but he keeps his trained forward.

* * *

There’s a campfire that night but he decides to skip it. The campfire had been where everything fell to shit, and he’s not eager to sit there and remember all that had happened last night/tonight/not at all. He had sat next to Will, who had sang loudly and horrendously in his ear. Nico had threatened to leave, and Will had grabbed his hand, yanked him back down with a laugh, promising he wouldn’t sing anymore. After the campfire Will had walked back to his cabin with him, and Nico had stood outside and decided that it was time, really, because he really, really wanted to and he was tired of being scared and he was a son of Hades, goddamnit, and he fought in two wars and he should not be afraid of this. So he had wrapped his fingers around Will’s wrist and tried to shift closer, because he has liked Will for ages and he’s ready, he was ready to try and put himself out there, to pull himself out of the shadows.

But Will’s eyes had widened and he had stepped away, mumbling about work, and Nico had realized that he could never leave the shadows. Will was brightness and sunshine – too bright for the shadows that were intrinsically a part of Nico.

So no. He doesn’t want to go to the campfire.

Not that anyone ever fucking listens to him.

“Jason said you weren’t coming to the campfire?”

“That was the plan.”

Will crosses his arms. He is wearing a sweater and jean shorts, which Nico thinks probably cancel each other out.

“Are you feeling sick?”

Nico rolls his eyes. “Do you have to be head medic 24/7? Take a break, Solace. And if you try to feel my forehead again I will cut off your hand,” he warns, as Will’s hand twitches upwards.

“I can’t just turn off worrying about people, Nico.”

“I’m fine. I was just tired. I was going to go to bed early. I’m not fucking sick!” He adds, slightly loudly, when Will narrows his eyes at him.

Will holds his hands up. “Okay. Fine. Just checking.”

Nico is very annoyed, and he really just wants Will to leave. “Do you want something else?” He asks, far harsher than the situation warranted. Will blinks, taking an unconscious step back.

“I figured you might want to hang out, if you’re set on not going to the campfire.”

“Well I don’t.”

“What is wrong with you? You’ve been acting weird all day.”

He really wants Will to leave. He can’t stop seeing the look on his face when he had realized what Nico was trying to do. “I’m fine, Will, I just want to go to bed.”

Will is still looking at him suspiciously, and Nico’s patience is wearing thin. “Fuck off, Solace!” He finally snaps.

The concerned look on Will’s face drops and is immediately replaced with a cool look of indifference.

“Fine. Enjoy your night of sulking.”

Nico watches him go, feeling foolish over his outburst. Part of him wants to go after him, but he forces himself to turn back around and head to bed. Ignoring the lamp that he had knocked down, he sits down on his bed, thinking.

The day had reset, meaning he had never tried to kiss Will, meaning the thing that had happened that had forced him to flee camp never happened. Meaning he could stay.

But on the other hand he still had that voice in his head telling him that he isn’t meant to settle down. Plus there’s the fact that he still has feelings for Will, although clearly they are unrequited.

He doesn’t want to leave, truthfully. But…

Eventually he decides to take another day. Maybe he can learn to live with his feelings for Will, to push them down and ignore them. He has to at least try. He doesn’t want to leave Jason, or Percy. If he can make it work…

He shuts off the lights and goes to sleep.


	3. Chapter 3

That morning Nico wakes up with a strange feeling of apprehension. He stares at the ceiling for a few minutes, trying to figure out the jumble of thoughts in his brain, but all that ends up happening is he’s just as confused as ever, this time with an added headache.

There’s a knock on his door. “Hang on,” he shouts, grabbing his clothes and changing quickly. As he is hurrying to the door, he stops suddenly.

The lamp he had smashed to the floor yesterday was fixed. He stares at it, a feeling of dread pooling in his stomach.

Jason is waiting for him. “Sup, dude?”

Feeling worse and worse, Nico asks a question that he knows will determine whether or not the gods have any mercy at all.

“Is there Capture the Flag today?”

Jason shoots him a look. “Yeah. Of course.”

* * *

It is too early for most of the Aphrodite campers, so it takes Nico a few loud knocks before Piper opens the door.

“Hey, Nico.”

“Is there a shrine to your mother?”

Piper blinks. “Pardon?”

“Do you guys have some kind of shrine to your mother in there?”

She eyes him suspiciously. “Yes. Why – feeling lucky in love?” She says with a smirk.

“Feeling unlucky in life,” he says. “Can I use it?”

Piper nods and motions for him to follow her.

“What is _he_ doing here?” Drew, hair in curlers, looks at him in disgust, and Nico momentarily thinks about how he had sunk her in dirt before realizing he hadn’t done that. He vows to bury her up to the elbows next time.

“Drew. We’ve talked about this.”

“I didn’t know ‘don’t be a bitch to everyone’ included _him.”_

“That’s usually what ‘everyone’ means.”

The Aphrodite cabin is a strange mixture of cluttered and clean. The beds are all nicely made (except for the ones that are still being slept in) but there is makeup scattered everywhere, a clothesline of clothes marked ‘delicates,’ and a hand written sign that says ‘It has been 4 days since the last Tristan McLean comment.’ Nico shoots Piper a questioning look, and she sighs.

“King of Sparta 2 came out last month.”

“And he was _so hot_ in it.”

Piper sighs, glaring at the girl who had spoken, and a young boy erases the 4 on the sign, writing in a 0 with chalk.

Piper opens the door to the bathroom and kicks out the people in there.

“The shrine’s in the bathroom?” He asks with raised eyebrows. Piper rolls her eyes.

“The rest of the cabin decided that the bathroom was where they needed our mother most.”

“Maybe you could pray for that sallow complexion.”

“Drew!”

“What? I’m being nice. I’m trying to improve him. You need a haircut, too.”

Nico ignores her, speaking only to Piper. “Could I have a moment, maybe?”

“Sure,” Piper says. “I’ll make sure no one eavesdrops.”

“Thank you,” he says. He waits a moment after the door closes and then turns to Aphrodite’s shrine. “If you think I’m going to respectfully pray to you then you’re wrong.”

There is movement behind him. “You’re very rude, you know.”

He turns to glare at Aphrodite, who is sitting on the closed toilet seat, looking far more glamorous than anyone really ought to look in a bathroom.

“What are you doing to me?”

“I thought we went over this.”

“Maybe _you_ went over this, but you certainly did not include me. Why is the day repeating?”

“You sound so angry. You weren’t quite as upset yesterday, if I recall,” she says coyly. Nico blushes.

“I didn’t know it was going to keep repeating,” he hisses. “Why is it repeating?”

“Well if I told you that, you wouldn’t learn anything, would you?”

He lets out an angry noise. “How do you have this much control over time?”

Aphrodite’s face darkens. “Once again you underestimate the power of love, Nico di Angelo. If you don’t start taking it seriously, it will be your downfall.”

He wants to tell her he’s not afraid of her, but he doesn’t want to make her angrier, and besides, it would be a lie.

“What do you want from me?”

When she looks at him, her eyes are almost kind. “I want you to understand.”

“Surely the rest of the gods have noticed you playing with time?”

“You would be amazed with what the gods don’t notice. You wouldn’t believe how self-involved they all are.”

“Pretty easy to believe, actually,” he says, glaring at her.

“Just you wait, Nico. At the end of this whole thing you will be thanking me.”

“I don’t know what you want me to do,” he says, almost desperately.

“There’s something important about today. Find it, and time will go back to normal again.”

“But why does the day have to repeat?”

“Because you are slippery, Nico di Angelo.” Nico doesn’t know what this means. He glares at the floor as Aphrodite says, “I will not come again. The rest is up to you.”

“Why me?” He asks. She smiles in a way that is almost fond.

“You’re just so interesting.” She glances at the door. “I would like to say hello to my children, but they won’t remember tomorrow. I advise you close your eyes.”

With a whiff of perfume and a flash of light, Aphrodite is gone.

* * *

He doesn’t change the game of Capture the Flag this time. Percy and Jason get the flag in record time, and everyone complains, leading Chiron to announce that he might have to make some revisions of the rules. Nico didn’t really listen; he had heard the speech before. It didn’t matter, anyway. Whatever it is he had to do to make time move again, he doubt it’s going to happen today, which means there will be Capture the Flag tomorrow, too. Which means it doesn’t matter.

Nothing matters, because he has no idea what the hell he’s supposed to do.

He ignores Will that day, to the point where it is almost rude. Will keeps flashing him hurt and angry looks, but he’s not going to remember, so it doesn’t matter. Nico could punch him in the face and tell him he loved him and it wouldn’t make a difference.

Not that he loves Will. Probably.

He skips the campfire again, although he knows that Jason is going to come after him, especially if Piper told him about today.

Sure enough Nico has only just changed into pyjamas when there is a knock on the door. Jason comes in, looking at him sitting expectantly on his bed.

“Hey,” he says, but Nico skips right to the point.

“I assume you want to know why I stopped by the Aphrodite cabin?”

“I am a little curious.”

Nico sighs. He’s really not eager to spill the whole sordid tale when in a few hours Jason won’t even remember. Now that he knows the day is going to end up repeating he’ll probably end up asking Jason for help, but there’s a few things he wants to try first.

Plus – and he’s not proud of this – old habits do die hard, and sometimes it is still hard for him to ask for help. Especially since the Will fiasco; he has become much less eager to open up to people, even Jason.

“It’s… a long story. I’ll tell you tomorrow.” Jason doesn’t look entirely satisfied, but he doesn’t push. That, he thinks, is one of the best parts about Jason. He always listened.

“All right. I take it you’re not going to the campfire?”

He shakes his head. “You should go, though. I’ll see you tomorrow.” Kind of. Jason heads out and Nico stares around the room. He eyes the lamp he had broken yesterday (yesterday’s today?) and – deliberately this time – takes it down again. Then he gets into bed and tries to fall asleep.

Tomorrow he has a plan. He’s going to find out just how far Aphrodite’s influence goes.

* * *

The first thing Nico does when he wakes up is look at the lamp.

Fixed. Fuck.

He doesn’t wait for Jason, nor does he leave any kind of note. If things go well, he’ll be back tomorrow to explain. If things go not so well, he’ll be back today and nothing will have happened.

He gets dressed and disappears into the shadows.

* * *

His plan is to go far away. Very far away. He wants to see if Aphrodite really has control over the whole world. He was going to see if Aphrodite could drag him back to Camp Half Blood if he was in, say, Russia. Or Australia.

He probably won’t be able to make it to Australia in one day, even though his shadow travelling had gotten more powerful, but he can sure as hell try to get as far away as possible from New York.

Wryly he wonders what Will would say if he knew Nico was planning to shadow travel across the world. Will had gotten much better in regards to the overprotective medic thing, partly because one time Nico had gotten incredibly annoyed and threatened to shadow travel into oblivion just to spite him. Still, despite Will’s laxer attitude towards the whole thing, he can only imagine what would happen if Will knew what he was planning to do. He would probably tie him to the bed, or something.

He avoids thinking about that.

He wonders what would happen if he actually DID shadow travel into oblivion. If he faded away, would he stay dead? Not that he’s eager to find out.

Truthfully, what he really wants to do is go to New Rome. He is dying to see Hazel and Reyna. He doubts they could help, but even seeing them would probably make him feel better. He had only been in this time loop for, what, two days? Three days? Fuck, he can’t even remember. It’s only been three days or so and he’s already off track.

Still, going to New Rome would only distract him. He would spend the whole day with his sister, and Aphrodite (Venus, he guesses) would definitely be able to reach him in New Rome. Plus he would probably have to explain, and neither Hazel nor Reyna know he tried to kiss Will. He isn’t sure if he’s avoiding telling them because he’s afraid of them pitying them or because he’s pretty sure if Hazel and Reyna ever teamed up in anger he thinks they could probably manage to level Camp Half Blood to the ground between them. At the very least the Apollo cabin. Or maybe he just doesn’t want to go through it again when time resets. Then again, technically he _hasn’t_ tried to kiss Will, so Will hasn’t turned him down.

This whole thing is way too fucking complicated.

Maybe he’ll go to New Rome another day, assuming this fails. Honestly he doesn’t have much faith in its success; he’s mostly just trying to test Aphrodite’s range.

Shadow travelling appears to have gotten easier ever since the Athena Parthenon, although he isn’t sure if this is actually the case, or if it’s just that after travelling around the world with two other people and a forty foot statue, anything less is basically a walk in the park. He also finds he is able to go greater distances in one jump; he can get to New Rome in one go, now. He had made the mistake of asking Will why he thought this was. Will had grabbed his hand and then said, voice full of wonder, “You’re more solid now.” Nico doesn’t know how this could be – maybe the fact that he had finally found a home with people he cared about made it easier for him to come out of the shadows.

He wonders if his decision to leave Camp Half Blood behind would impact that solidity. He remembers the way Will had held his hand a beat too long and thinks that if it does, he can’t be completely blamed.

* * *

He ends up in Italy and debates sticking around, but the idea is to get far away from the gods, not go to the fucking homeland. He ends up stopping at a McDonald’s first. He isn’t generally the biggest fan of McDonald’s; the food usually makes him feel sick and it tends to remind him of that awful year with Minos and trying to get a hold of Bianca, but ever since Percy introduced him to Oreo McFlurries he had tweaked his opinion slightly. Him, Jason, and Percy tended to sit up on Jason’s roof with the treat on a regular basis, since his shadow travel meant he could get there and back rather quickly. One time Annabeth and Will had caught them on top of the Zeus cabin. They had waited to be chewed out, and they were, sort of – Annabeth had ordered him back out to get them some immediately.

“I thought doctors didn’t like McDonald’s,” he had said to Will. Will had smiled at him.

“Everybody likes ice cream,” he had said, stealing a spoonful of Nico’s McFlurry.

No. He’s not going to think about that.

He considers where to go next. He wonders if he could make it to Antarctica. Freezing cold and unpopulated – Aphrodite’s worst nightmare.

He ends up wandering. He does go to Antarctica, actually, although it’s pretty fucking cold, so that doesn’t last long. He hits a lot of places. Honestly, he tires himself out. He doesn’t really do much, but he stays up all night, ready to watch the day break, ready to fight back Aphrodite with his bare hands. So needless to say, he isn’t happy when, just as the sun breaks over the horizon, he gets that feeling in his stomach as the world goes black, and he is thrown off his feet.


	4. Chapter 4

Nico lets out a string of curses that would have offended Ares and smashes the shit out of his cabin. It will go back to normal tomorrow, anyway. He can do whatever the fuck he wanted with no consequences. He could flip off Chiron, could kiss Will again – fuck, he could even kiss Percy if he were still so inclined.

He sits down on his bed and buries his head in his hands. In a little while Jason will knock on his door, and he will say _sup, dude,_ then they will go down to breakfast and Percy will ask to be on their team and then he will have to play Capture the Flag.

Again.

Fuck that.

* * *

“Darling,” Persephone drawls when she looks up and sees Nico. “Your son is here.”

Hades sighs and wipes his hands on a napkin, pushing away a plate of food. Persephone excuses herself.

“I was expecting you, Nico. What day is it now? The fourth?”

Nico sits down across from his father. “You know?”

“Of course. The same people have died four days in a row. Aphrodite has no idea the problem she has created. She treats the world like a play thing.” Hades shakes his head in disgust.

“Then you can’t stop it?”

He surveys his son. “I have no control here. I imagine I am the only one who is even aware. Persephone has not noticed. Truly I do not understand where she gets the power.”

“Caerus is helping.”

Hades scoffs. “Of course. For what is more powerful than opportunity.” He shakes his head. “You won’t be safe here.”

“There’s no way she’ll come into your domain.”

“No, but Aphrodite is not the one who brings you back. It is a magic I do not understand, and a magic you cannot hide from.”

Nico swears. “So what am I supposed to do?”

“Aphrodite did this for a reason. I don’t claim to be an expert on love, Nico. Something happened on the original day that prompted her to interfere. That’s where the solution to this lies. That’s all the advice I have. But please, I am begging you, fix this soon.” At Nico’s questioning look, Hades sighs. “It is Persephone’s turn to pick the movie. If I have to watch Steel Magnolias one more time I am not sure what I will do.” Nico can’t help but laugh a little bit at that, although Hades looks significantly less amused. “Stay if you like, Nico. Watch Steel Magnolias, even. But the Underworld will not protect you.”

* * *

Nico does not stay for Steel Magnolias, although he does stay in the Underworld. Despite what his father says, he’s still going to see how far Aphrodite can go. It is disconcerting, being in the Underworld with no sun to watch. He debates going to see Cerberus, or maybe he could even find Mrs. O’Leary, but knowing that they wouldn’t remember it tomorrow makes him reluctant to do so. Plus there’s always a chance, by going to see Cerberus, that he could see Minos, and that is a can of worms he just does not wish to open.

He thinks about Bianca. He wonders where she is. He isn’t surprised she chose rebirth. She probably would have wanted to experience more of life. He fiddles with his ring.

He wonders if she’s happy, wherever she is. Whoever she is. It is strange, to think that she is out there somewhere, a different name, a different body, but the same soul. A soul that doesn’t remember him.

He wonders what she’s done today that keeps getting repeated.

Eventually he drifts off. His bedroom in the Underworld is pretty bare, but the bed is comfortable. He drifts off to the muffled noise of his father and Persephone bickering (“Of all the movies in the world, why do you want to watch _Steel Magnolias?”_ “It’s a good movie and it’s my choice, if you don’t like it you shouldn’t have made that rule!”), and he wakes up in his cabin, light filtering through the curtains, all of the things that he had thrown around in his anger back in place.

Nico swears for a straight minute. Then he kicks his bed.

Then he sits down on his bed, buries his head in his hands, and tries not to cry in frustration.

He fails, although he doesn’t really think he can be blamed. He vaguely hears Jason knock on the door but he thinks if he has to hear him say _sup, dude,_ one more time he might find out what happens if he kills himself. After a few moments Jason tentatively enters the cabin. He looks surprised at the sight of Nico, who is wiping away tears as Jason comes in.

“What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

It is barely nine in the morning. He might as well tell him. Maybe Jason will be able to help. His first instinct is still to keep everything to himself, but he’s out of ideas, and Jason is his best friend.

There’s only so much you can do by yourself.

“I have been living the same day over for about four or five days now.”

It is a testament to life as a demigod that Jason does not seem to find anything particularly odd about this sentence.

“What do you mean?”

Nico sighs, aware that the beginning of this story is going to make Jason very angry.

“I was planning on running away from camp.” Sure enough, Jason’s face hardens.

“When were you planning on doing this?” Jason’s voice is filled with hurt and betrayal and Nico finds himself looking forward to tomorrow when he won’t have told Jason anything.

“Four days ago. This morning.”

Jason narrows his eyes. “And why? Some stupid reason, I assume.”

He resists the urge to snap back at Jason. He has every right to be upset, he thinks to himself.

“I tried to kiss Will. And he rejected me.” _And we’ve had this conversation before._

Jason’s face, which had been glaring at him, softens. Nico would rather have the glare.

“What? When?”

Nico sighs again. Such an unnecessarily complicated question to answer.

“Four days ago. This evening.”

Jason rubs a hand over his face. “Gods. Okay. Tell me the whole story.”

“I’m trying, you keep interrupting!” Jason gives him a look but mimes zipping his mouth shut anyway. Nico shakes his head. Part of him is still reluctant to waste all this time telling Jason about this when in a little under 24 hours he won’t remember.

“Four days ago – but still today – I tried to kiss Will. It was after the campfire. He walked me back to my cabin, and I just – I don’t know. You know how I feel about Will. So I… well. And he stepped away, ran back to the infirmary.”

“But that doesn’t make sense! I thought for sure –”

“Yeah, well,” Nico says, trying not to sound too bitter. “Looks like we were both wrong.”

“So that happened and you decided to split?”

He grimaces. Nothing he says here will make sense to Jason. Not to Jason Grace, Praetor, Golden Boy. Superman. Hero.

“It wasn’t just that. It’s… I don’t know. Lately there’s been this voice in my head that keeps whispering all the old things. You know. That I don’t belong, that I never will… you know.” He finds himself unable to look Jason in the eye; he plays with the fraying threads on the comforter. “And then the whole thing with Will…” he finds himself unable to finish this thought aloud. He is too embarrassed. He thinks Jason probably knows what he means, though. “Anyway. I was intercepted by everyone’s favourite goddess Aphrodite.” Jason makes a face. “Except this time she was accompanied by Caerus.”

Jason’s eyebrows knit together. “Who?”

“He’s a son of Zeus.”

Jason groans. “Of course he is. They always are.”

“He – I don’t know his Roman equivalent. I don’t know if he has one, even. He’s the god of opportunity. Apparently he also has some control over time. Kairos, he called it. Time made of moments. Some shit like that. Aphrodite muttered something about taking a personal interest in me.”

“Lucky you.”

“Yes, I’m thrilled. And then they reset the day. I don’t know how. And I’ve had to go through this bullshit like, four times or something. It’s hard to keep track. I think it’s been four since the original, so five in total. Three capture the flags. Three times you’ve greeted me ‘sup dude.’”

Jason laughs.

“I went around the world. I went to the fucking Underworld. Nothing stops it.”

“Does your dad know?”

Nico nods. “He’s the only one. The same people are dying every day. But he’s the only one who’s noticed, he says.”

“I guess even the gods get used to routine.”

“And that’s pretty much where I am now.”

Jason whistles. “Shit. How many times have you told me this?”

“This is only the first time.”

Jason thinks for a bit. “It’s got to have something to do with love.”

“What does?”

“Whatever Aphrodite wants you to do to break the cycle. I mean, she’s the goddess of love. She wants you to find a reason to stay at camp. It’s got to be love. It’s kind of her MO.”

“Love with _who?_ There’s no one…” he trails off. Jason shrugs.

“I don’t know. But with Aphrodite it’s can’t be anything else.”

“So what, Aphrodite wants me to pick another guy and fall in love with him? And she’s going to hold me hostage until I do? That doesn’t make sense! How am I supposed to do that when he wouldn’t even remember the next day?”

“They’re gods. They don’t make sense.”

Nico groans. Jason looks at him in sympathy. “Have you talked to Chiron?”

He shakes his head. “What’s he going to do? My father had no ideas. And telling Chiron would involve telling him why I was trying to run away. And I’m not exactly eager to explain.”

“You think it’s something he hasn’t heard before? He’s three thousand years old. He’s _Greek.”_

“Yes, I keep being told that.”

Jason leans back on his hands. “So what are you going to do?”

“I don’t fucking know. I need time to think. Figure out if this is really what I need to do. If Aphrodite is forcing me to get over Will. It just –”

“Doesn’t seem like a very Aphrodite thing to do?”

“Exactly.”

“Maybe you should talk to Annabeth. Aphrodite took a special interest in her and Percy, remember?”

Nico makes a face. “I guess.” Sensing his reluctance, Jason presses.

“If anyone is going to have an idea, it’ll be Annabeth.”

He thinks about this. “I guess. I don’t know. I’m not too eager to tell a lot of people when tomorrow I won’t have told anybody at all.”

“Think about it, at least. Piper too. You have people who can help you, you know.”

“I know, Jason.”

“Do you?”

Nico rolls his eyes. “It had nothing to do with that.”

“You not feeling like you belong definitely has to do with your friends.”

“Can we talk about this later?”

“I won’t remember this tomorrow, and who’s to say you’ll tell me again?”

Jason knows him far too well.

“We have all of today, okay? I just need to think. I haven’t really thought. Just ran.”

Jason looks deeply mistrustful.

“I mean it. I need to just… go over my options. There has to be something else.”

Jason narrows his eyes, but eventually he nods in defeat. “Fine. But we will be talking about this later.”

“Fine. Later.”

Jason stands up and shoots him another mistrustful glare. Nico rolls his eyes. “Go, Jason. Go get ready for Capture the Flag. Percy’s on our team, his prank war with Piper came at the expense of Annabeth.”

Jason laughs. “I knew that was going to get him in trouble. Hey, what happens at Capture the Flag?”

“You and Percy get the flag so quickly that the other team gets mad and Chiron says he has to re-evaluate the teams and powers and stuff.”

“So we should slow down?”

“I’m skipping this one. Tell them I’m sick.”

“Chiron will send a medic.”

“Chiron will send Will. I can handle Will.”

“Nico –”

“Go. I need to think.” He doesn’t know what Jason is going to say about Will, but he knows he doesn’t want to hear it.

Jason gives him a look, but doesn’t press the subject. “After Capture the Flag, we’ll discuss this more.”

“Fine.”

Jason – finally – leaves. He likely doesn’t have much time before Will is sent. Generally speaking the only reason they were supposed to miss Capture the Flag was if they were on their death bed. That means he has to come up with an adequate excuse to get him out of it, as well as think about what the fuck he’s supposed to do about this current situation.

He is getting more and more desperate the more he thinks about it. He knows he should listen to Jason; should tell Chiron, Annabeth, Piper, ask them for their help, but something is holding him back. Part of it is some instinct, cowardly as it is, to run away and bury his head in the sand, but that isn’t really going to be much help. Some aspect of it is the looming thought that he will have to tell everybody this over and over again if he wants help over multiple days.

But, he admits, as he sees a flash of blond, the main reason he is so hesitant is because –

“You had better be dying in there!”

“Your concern is heartwarming, Solace, truly.”

Will storms in, blue eyes quickly appraising Nico to ensure he has all his limbs. He grabs Nico’s wrist and locates his pulse.

“You might want to treat your patients a bit nicer, you know.”

Will grins crookedly at him.

Truthfully, the main reason he is so hesitant is because he doesn’t want to get over Will.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i cannot tell you why i picked steel magnolias of all fucking movies i havent even SEEN it why was that the first movie i thought of what does that say about me i don't understand


	5. Chapter 5

“It doesn’t really seem like there’s anything wrong with you,” Will says suspiciously. Nico snorts.

“Look a little harder, I guarantee you will find something.”

Will ignores this, staring at Nico with his eyes narrowed. “What’s wrong with you?”

“You just said there was nothing wrong with me.”

“I know there is nothing wrong with you. You know there is nothing wrong with you. But you’re saying something is wrong with you. So?”

Nico resists the urge to laugh. He used to think Will was a laid back, easy going guy, but after getting to know him he realized Will was far fiercer than he let on. Quick witted and sharp tongued, Will was always quick to call him out on his shit. The downside of this was that Will had a bad habit of being overprotective – he can remember one time Will had angrily ordered him not to shadow travel again. Nico had shadow traveled everywhere in camp and refused to talk to Will until he apologized.

“Every time you do it I’m reminded of when you almost faded away to nothing.”

“Well stop.”

“Yeah, that’s how that works.” Will had grabbed his hand. Will did that a lot. “Sometimes I just have to remind myself that you’re solid.”

One beat, two beats, three beats. Will was still holding his hand when Jason had come in, who had stared between the two of them in confusion until his eyes found their interlocked hands. He had raised an eyebrow at Nico, who had quickly shaken his hand out of Will’s grasp.

And yet…

And yet Will had pulled away from him. Look, Nico wasn’t exactly Mr. Love Connection, but _come on._

“Would you believe that I just don’t want to play Capture the Flag?”

“Not even remotely.”

“Yeah, I didn’t think so.”

Will sits down on his bed and crosses his arms, staring Nico down. “So?”

Nico sighs and leans against the wall, looking at a spot just about Will’s shoulder. “I didn’t sleep well?”

“You never sleep well. Next?”

“I… am out of excuses.”

“The best excuse is the truth.”

Nico smirks, and he makes eye contact. “That’s pretty. Did your dad tell you that?”

Will throws one of his pillows at him. Nico evades it easily.

“What don’t you want to join in on Capture the Flag?”

“I don’t know, Solace, it just… lately it kind of feels like I’ve been doing nothing BUT Capture the Flag.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“Lots of things about me don’t make sense.”

“Don’t pretend to be so mysterious, Nico, and tell me what the hell is going on.”

He sighs. He really needs less annoying friends.

So he settles for the truth. Or a little bit of it, at least.

“I’m just beginning to feel a little… strung out.”

Will’s annoyance drops immediately and is replaced with Good Doctor face. “What do you mean strung out?”

“Just… tired. I don’t know. Doesn’t it sometimes feel a little… pointless? Like – like shouting into the fucking void, or something, or, or…” He takes a breath, steadying himself. “It’s like Sisyphus.”

“Which one was he? The eagle?”

“The boulder. You should catch up on your Greek myth.”

“It’s not my fault your father has punished so many people.”

“Sisyphus deserved it. He kidnapped Death. Long story. Anyway. Sisyphus’ punishment is that he has to roll this huge boulder up a hill for all eternity, but every time he gets to the top the boulder falls back down and he has to start over again.”

“Harsh.”

“Everything is beginning to feel like that. It’s like…” He sits down next to Will. It’s strange – he had meant the current situation when he started talking, but now that he’s thinking about it more he realizes that it’s way more than that. Will watches him with a strange expression on his face.

Like he understands.

“It’s just, like… I’m seventy fucking years old, or something. Jesus.” He laughs, but it’s not very funny. “And fifty odd years of that was spent in an arcade playing Duck Hunt and then I was brought out and in the span of like four fucking years my sister died and then I had to fight in two wars and people _died,_ so many goddamn people died and I cannot fucking believe that someone expects me to give any kind of shit whatsoever about _Capture the Flag._ ” There is bitterness and resentment in his voice and he glances up, hoping Aphrodite was listening. “And I don’t deserve this shit. I have had _enough.”_

“Nico.” Will lays a gentle hand on his arm but Nico pulls away immediately and stands up, crossing to the other side of the room.

“I know what you mean,” Will says softly.

He needs to get out of here. The air is stifling and too hot and Will is giving him this _look_ and he doesn’t understand a thing. He is too old for this. He is too young for this.

His life is a walking fucking paradox.

Will must see something in his face because he stands up, holding a hand out as if to grab Nico, but Nico is in the shadows already.

* * *

He emerges somewhere in the city. It’s windy today, and it immediately helps him, cool on his face, and he takes a breath, ducking into an alley and leaning against a wall, trying to catch his breath.

He hadn’t even realized he had been feeling these things until they spilled out of him.

He was _angry._ Jesus, he was angry. He was fuming. Because this was _bullshit._ Bullshit that they had to fight their wars and save their asses and save the goddamn _world_ and fuck, it wasn’t enough for them. They were expected to step up and fight a war that wasn’t their own and what did they get in return? A few select heroes might get some kind of reward, but the rest of them didn’t even get a thank you. And then they were expected to step over the dead bodies of their friends and play Capture the fucking Flag, sing at a campfire and pretend that they weren’t all going to go bed that night with nightmares of death and monsters and parents who didn’t care.

And then he had to deal with _this fucking shit –_

“Help! Help! PLEASE!”

Oh, he really couldn’t catch a fucking break.

The scream came from farther down the alley, but he couldn’t really see anything. He draws his sword and pads lightly down the alley. Eventually he sees a huge, hulking figure and the much smaller silhouette of a young boy, cowering against the wall.

Upon closer inspection he sees that it’s a cyclops, bearing down over this young child – he can’t be older than 11. He wonders what he sees.

He is in no mood for heroics. The cyclops is too focused on this seemingly easy meal to notice Nico sneak up behind him and stab him through the chest.

He looks down at the sword sticking through him in a way that is almost comical, before disintegrating into dust. Nico blows his hair out of his face.

“Go back home kid,” he says. The boy stares up at him in wonder.

“He only had one eye.”

Nico stops from where he had turned to leave. He turns back to look at the boy. “What?”

“That man. He only had one eye. And then you turned him into dust. Is that a magic sword?”

“You can see this?”

“Of course. Is it sharp? Why is it black?”

Oh, that’s just great. Just fucking peachy. That’s what he needs, is some nosy little demigod who hadn’t been claimed yet. Some nosy little demigod who –

Some nosy little demigod who was very likely killed the other five days that Nico hadn’t been here to save him.

He looks down at him. He is looking at Nico’s sword with interest.

“What time is it, kid?”

The boy checks a clunky watch on his wrist. “10:23.”

“Okay. Run along home, now. Try not to lurk in any more alleys. It’s not a good place to be.” Nico peers back out at the street to figure out where they are.

“I don’t have a home,” he says, matter-of-factly, because of fucking course he doesn’t. Because the gods hate him, so why would this child have a home. “I usually sleep here.”

Nico sighs. “Don’t you have someone you could go see?”

“The only person I ever had was my sister, but I don’t know where she is.”

Something complicated is happening in Nico’s chest. “You have a sister?”

“Yeah, but I don’t know where she is. She went to get food a while ago, but she hasn’t come back.”

“When did she go to get food?”

The boy turns and Nico notices a bunch of marks carved into the wall. “Two and a half weeks,” he says after counting them. Nico’s heart constricts. “But it’s okay, she does this a lot. She always comes back. Last time she brought me this watch,” he says proudly, thrusting his wrist out at Nico. “She told me to stay here.”

 Nico sighs and runs a hand through his hair. “Kid – what’s your name?”

“Billy.”

“Billy. Great. I’m Nico. Has she ever been gone this long?”

“Well –” for the first time since the cyclops had been killed the smile on his face falters. “No. Normally it isn’t more than a few days.”

And Nico is brought back, suddenly, six years, and he is ten years old and Percy Jackson is in front of him and he is telling him that Bianca is gone –

Billy bites his lip and peers up at Nico’s face. “You don’t think she’s coming back, do you?”

How did Percy do this? He’s trying to remember the words he used. Not, in hindsight, that that had turned out very well for either of them.

“It’s… not likely.”

Billy looks at where the remains of the cyclops had been. “Do you think she met something like that?”

“It’s… possible.”

He makes a mental note – he is not good with children.

Billy’s lower lip starts to tremble, but he steels himself and stands up straighter, looking Nico in the eye. “I think she’s still alive. She has to be.”

Nico isn’t going to dispute this. The world will reset tomorrow, anyway.

This boy will die again tomorrow.

_Fuck._

“Sure. Listen. It isn’t safe for you to be wandering around like this. What happened to your parents?”

“My dad is dead. I don’t know where my mom is.”

All right. That eliminates 50% of the gods or so.

“What if I told you I could take you somewhere where you’d be totally safe?”

Billy looks around at their dismal surroundings. “But… but Alanna won’t know where to find me.”

Nico sighs again. “I’ll tell you what, if you come with me now, I promise I’ll take you back with me to check here.”

He looks torn, but they’re not exactly glamorous digs, and Nico thinks that’s probably what sways him. “You’ll take me back?”

“I promise.”

“Okay. Do you have a car?”

Nico smirks. “Not exactly.”

Normally he would take him to Camp Half Blood, but he’s not exactly eager to head back there. In the back of his mind a part of himself is wondering why he’s putting all this effort in for this child who will be in the exact same position tomorrow, but he can’t deny the fact that Billy reminds him of himself, all those years ago, before all this bullshit happened.

He’s going to come back tomorrow, too. He knows he is. Because he’s a sentimental fool, and because he doesn’t want this little boy to die again.

He’ll take him to New Rome. Mostly because if there’s one person who would be able to make him feel better right now, it would be his sister.

“Where are we going to go?”

“California.”

Billy looks at him in confusion. “How?”

“It’s kind of like my sword. Almost.” Not at all.

“Is it gonna hurt?”

“No. It might feel a little strange, but it shouldn’t hurt. We’re going to go see my sister.”

“You have a sister, too?”

Nico smiles at him. “Yeah, I do. She’s really nice. You’ll like her. Hold on tight to me, okay?”

Billy goes to grab his arm, but then he stops. “Alanna says I’m not supposed to run off with strangers.”

“Even strangers who save you from one eyed monsters?”

He nods. Nico tries to keep the annoyance off his face. “Here – you can hold my sword. That way you’re armed, and I’m not. Okay?”

Billy looks at the sword with wide eyes as Nico holds it out to him, and he takes it, holding it reverently.

“You have to hold on to it really tightly though, okay? You can’t drop it.”

Billy nods, and he holds it so tightly with both hands that his knuckles turn white.

This is stupid, he knows, and unnecessary, and silly, and utterly useless, but he reaches out and holds Billy’s arm tightly, and he counts down from three, and then he steps into the shadows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow its almost like children fighting a war would massively fuck them up..............what a strange concept 
> 
> no im not bitter


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edit: can you fucking believe I updated my Groundhog Day AU on actual Groundhog Day without making a note of that I have failed you all

They emerge on a hill near Camp Jupiter. Billy falls over as soon as they land, almost succeeding in impaling himself on Nico’s sword. He looks around with wide eyes, and then he looks at Nico.

“What did you do?”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Tell me!”

“We traveled through the shadows.”

If he had expected that to shut this child up, he was sorely mistaken. Billy scrambles up and follows behind Nico, talking the entire time.

“Wow! Really? How did you do that? What happens? Do we become shadows? Can you go anywhere? Can you teach me?” He waves the sword around at a passing wasp, and Nico takes it out of his hands.

“That’s really not a toy.”

“I don’t like wasps. I was stung once when I was little and I cried for two straight hours. Alanna always told me that I had to stand still and they wouldn’t bother me but it’s hard to stand still when it’s so close to you. Alanna didn’t like crawly bugs and I didn’t like flying bugs so I would kill all the spiders and stuff and she would always try and kill the wasps for me, even though it’s hard to kill wasps because they fly and stuff.”

Nico is regretting this every single step.

“Shouldn’t you be a little more scared, kid? Big scary monster? Shadow travelling? Don’t you want to be quiet and think about all the things you’ve witnessed?” _Please be quiet._

“I’ve seen stuff like that my whole life, one time when I was younger there was this really weird woman who tried to hurt me, and she had two different legs! One of them was a donkey leg and she looked like this weird snake lady but my father didn’t believe me, only Alanna believed me, and then when I was eight my father died and there was no one else to take us and Alanna said we had to run away in order to stay together and I saw –”

He keeps prattling on. He’s far too fucking cheery for a boy who has been living on the streets for three years after the death of his father and who has now almost definitely been left by his sister. Not that Nico wants him to be depressed, or anything, but a little bit of sadness to quiet him down wouldn’t be _too_ bad, he thinks.

“Where are we going now? Are we going to meet your sister? What’s her name? Are we really in California?”

“Somewhere with other people like you. Yes. Hazel. Yes.”

“What do you mean people like me?”

Nico glances at him. “Like us. People who can see things other people can’t.”

Billy is – blissfully – quiet for a moment before he says, in a much quieter voice, “Do you think they’ll know where Alanna went?”

Nico sighs heavily. “I don’t know, kid. Maybe.”

* * *

“You are in _trouble.”_

This is how Reyna greets him, arms crossed with her dogs at her feet. Hazel hugs him, but after she steps back, standing beside Reyna with her hands on her waist. Nico glances at Frank, who is the only one who doesn’t look ready to kill him.

“Jason called?”

Frank nods.

Great. “What did he say?”

“Just that you’ve disappeared again.”

Silently, he thanks Jason for not spilling his secret, although the look in Reyna’s eyes tells him that he was probably able to convince them of the severity of his crime some other way.

“Was it really necessary to bring the dogs out,” he asks her with a raised eyebrow.

“You tell me.”

There is a tugging on his sleeve, and Billy steps out from where he had hidden behind him at the angry tone in Reyna’s voice. Nico doesn’t blame him. He kind of wishes he had someone to hide behind.

Cyclops didn’t scare the kid, but an angry Reyna did. Maybe Billy was smarter than Nico had given him credit for.

“Are those real dogs?”

“No. They’re made of gold and silver. They can tell when you’re lying.”

Billy gapes at him. “Really?”

“Try it out.”

Billy looks between the two of them. “The sky is green.”

“They react to feelings,” Reyna looks away from Nico to address Billy. “Lie about something you’re feeling, or that you’ve done. They don’t care about the colour of the sky. They care about human emotion.”

Billy swallows. “I killed that monster today.”

Both Argentum and Aurum stand up and turn their heads towards Billy, who takes another step behind Nico.

“They won’t hurt you,” Reyna says. “They’ll only attack if I tell them to.” She turns her gaze back to Nico, as if to say _and I’m debating it._

“I’m not sure what Jason told you, but he must have over exaggerated if you’re this angry at me.”

“Uh,” Frank speaks up. “Are you going to explain why you have a nine year old following you around?”

“I’m turning 11 next month!” Billy says indignantly. Frank apologizes.

Good old Frank. Nico quickly latches onto this change of topic. 

“Right. This is Billy. He was being attacked by a cyclops. He’s an orphan. His father is dead, his sister is missing, and he never knew his mother.” He looks meaningfully at Reyna, who turns her eyes back to him to study him.

“And he’s a demigod?”

“I assume so. He recognized the cyclops for what it was. Saw my sword as a sword. And he says he’s run into more monsters in his life.”

“Why are you talking about me like I’m not here?”

Reyna sighs. “Deal with him,” she says, nodding at Nico but eyes on Hazel. “Billy, you come with me. You too, Frank.”

“Frank, don’t leave me.”

Frank smiles at him. “Sorry, Nico. Duty calls.”

“Frank!” Frank salutes him loosely before falling into step with Reyna. Billy looks at him nervously. “It’s okay,” Nico assures him. “She’s just mad at me, but she’ll help you.”

“You told me we’d go back,” he says quietly, as if he didn’t want Hazel to hear.

“We will. But you have to go with Reyna right now. I’ll find you after I’m done being yelled at, okay?”

Billy nods and reluctantly steps away. Frank has stopped a few feet ahead, waiting, and him and Billy start talking quietly as they walk away. Nico watches this for as long as he reasonably can before turning back to Hazel.

She doesn’t look angry anymore.

“Jason said you were planning on running away again. From all of us.” She looks heartbroken, and Nico takes back his previous thankfulness for Jason. He sighs.

“It’s not as simple as that, Hazel.”

“How is it not simple?”

“I would never – I wouldn’t just leave without seeing you. I would never do that to you.”

“But you’d do it to everyone else? To Jason, to Reyna, to Percy and Annabeth and everyone else? To Will?”

“I’m sure he’d be real torn up about it,” he says before he can stop himself.

“Is that why you wanted to run away? Did something happen with you and Will?”

Coming out to Hazel was probably the scariest thing he had ever done. He hadn’t honestly known how she would take it – on the one hand he had felt sure that she would accept him, because she was his sister, and he was closer to her than with anyone, but at the same time Hazel had come from a different world. A different time.

Jason had said he was being ridiculous. Hazel had said the same thing after.

“No, Hazel – look, it’s a long story, and I’m tired, and I just saved a child from a goddamn monster, okay, and I think I deserve a little bit of a rest for that. Can’t we talk about this tomorrow?”

“Jason said I was to order you back there immediately.”

Of course he did. “I don’t want to go back there.”

“Yeah, we both assumed you’d say that, so you’re to IM him instead. And that is an order from your praetor!”

“Reyna can’t order me around, this isn’t my camp.”

“Reyna can order anyone around and you know it.”

He smiles slightly. “I wouldn’t have done anything without coming to see you, Hazel, you know that.”

“But why would you have done it in the first place?”

He shoves his hands in his pockets. “Hazel, I’ve already had this conversation with Jason, and I have to call him, and I told Billy I would – there’s not enough time today. Please. Can we talk about this tomorrow?”

Hazel purses her lips at him but eventually she nods. He’s immensely grateful. This day has been too much for him already, and it was barely 11:00 in the morning. Plus he still had to deal with Reyna, who wasn’t likely to be as forgiving as Hazel.

“I’m gonna go call Jason,” he mumbles. He hopes Hazel won’t follow him, and she doesn’t.

Camp Jupiter officially built a small building where Iris Messages could be placed to ensure quick communications between Camp Half Blood, and that’s where he heads now, although he has to force himself to put one foot in front of the other.

“Jason Grace, Camp Half Blood,” he says, half hoping maybe Iris is on vacation, or something.

But – as has been established – the gods hated Nico.

Jason’s face appears, looking very, _very_ irritated.

“Hi.”

Jason scowls. “What the hell, Nico?”

He rubs the back of his neck. “I was feeling a little overwhelmed.”

“So you decided to ditch anyway?”

“I was going to come back, honestly, but I ran into a kid that I had to save from a cyclops and I didn’t want to head back there immediately so I brought him to Camp Jupiter and then I had to deal with – I’m sorry.”

One of the things he had learned after the war – life was easier when you apologized when you should.

“You’re not allowed to run away when I won’t remember any of this tomorrow.”

“I know, Jason. It’s okay. I’m going to figure it out. And tomorrow I’m going to start actually trying to fix this. I’ll talk to Annabeth and Piper. Just let me have this today. Being with Hazel will help.”

Jason looks like he’s about to argue but eventually he just sighs. “Promise me you’ll tell me again.”

“I promise, Jason. I don’t want to be in this situation either.”

Jason seems momentarily mollified. “Will isn’t happy with you.”

“Will won’t remember any of this tomorrow.”

“We’re going to figure this out, Nico.”

He nods, although he isn’t sure how convinced he is of this. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he says with a wry smile.

When he’s finished he heads back to Reyna and Billy. When he finds them he sees that Reyna is staring at him with a rather glassy look while Billy fires questions at her.

“Do I get to learn how to use a sword? Or a bow? Which one do you like better?” When Nico closes the door behind him he looks back and erupts into a grin when he sees him. “Nico! Do you know the Greek and Roman gods are real?”

“You don’t say,” he says.

“He accepted it rather quickly,” Reyna mutters as Billy starts talking animatedly to Frank.

“He doesn’t have any other choice,” he says. “Did he tell you about his sister?”

She nods. “Probably dead, I assume.”

Nico watches Billy sadly. “He won’t believe you.”

“I think he already knows.”

He looks at her. “What makes you think that?”

“Whenever he talks about her… he assures me that she’s alive but Aurum and Argentum… it’s like they almost react. They get agitated. It’s not a quite a lie, but he isn’t as convinced as he likes to pretend.” She turns to look at him. “So I hear you were about to run away.”

He sighs. “That’s not –”

“I imagine everyone has already said everything there is to be said.” He nods. “I just want you to know – two years ago I said we have two homes, and that includes you. You don’t have to run away. You can just… come here. You have family here, too, Nico. We are your family. I am your family.”

Nico shifts. Reyna is not looking at him anymore. He swallows audibly and nods again. “I’m sorry.”

“I know.” She pats his hand lightly. “I know.”

* * *

“When are we going to go back to check?” Billy asks later. Nico had offered to take him for hot chocolate, and they were sitting outside now, watching the sunset.

“How about we go tomorrow, okay?” He expects Billy to protest on the grounds that she might have returned today, but he doesn’t, which makes Nico think that Reyna must have been right.

“I was thinking, we can leave a note, telling her where I went!”

“Don’t you think she might get a little concerned if you leave a note telling her that you’re in a magic camp in California?”

Billy grins. “Good point. So what if we left a note telling her when I’ll be back! Like, like every two days at noon, or something, and we can keep checking then and if she finds it she’ll know when I’ll be back.”

Nico nods and sips his own hot chocolate. “That’s a good idea. We can do that.”

They sit in silence. Billy is swinging his legs, and every so often they hit the table and shake it, but Nico doesn’t bother to ask him to stop.

“Thank you for saving me,” Billy finally says again, speaking quietly.

“I wasn’t going to let that cyclops kill you, kid.”

“Can I tell you something?”

“Sure.”

“You won’t think I’m crazy?”

“We’re sitting in a city guarded by a statue, ruled over by people descended from Greek and Roman gods, and you think I’m going to think you’re crazy?”

He smiles nervously. “I’ve been having this bad dream, and I meet that monster, like I did today, but I – nothing happens, you don’t come, and he kills me. And it – I know it’s just a dream, but it _hurts._ It hurts a lot, and it’s scary, and I’m afraid that I’m going to dream of that again tonight.”

Nico is staring at him, trying to keep the horror off his face. He puts his hot chocolate down and swallows.

“That dream won’t ever happen again, Billy,” he says quietly. “I promise.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> dun dun DUNNNNNN


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am going on vacation for about a week and a half leaving on wednesday so i'm going to try and upload one other chapter before i go since i will be gone for a while

The next morning he wakes up in his cabin, which is how he knows the day reset again, because he went to sleep at Camp Jupiter.

This is probably the day when he should talk to Annabeth and Piper, but yesterday had been so tiring that all he wants to do today is sleep. He knows that he isn’t going to be able to do that, but he is desperate for a day with even the tiniest semblance of normalcy, so he’ll start asking for help later. For today he’s going to kick back and live through this day as if it were a normal day – that includes Capture the Flag, and even the campfire. He’s not particularly eager to redo the day, but he thinks he deserves the chance to sit back and pretend like his life wasn’t falling to shit.

He gets up and gets dressed and goes to meet Jason, mostly because hearing _sup, dude,_ would totally ruin what he was hoping would be a fairly decent day, considering he’s lived through it about five times already.

As he’s sitting on the steps of the Zeus cabin he tries to figure out exactly how many days he’s lived through. There was the first one, when he tried to kiss Will. There was the second day, when he didn’t. The third day was when he had tested Aphrodite’s limits by running around the world, and the fourth he gone to the Underworld with his father. That meant that yesterday was the fifth, which means today is the sixth time he has relived this day.

When Jason finally comes outside to meet him he looks surprised to see Nico sitting on his front steps.

“Hey. What’s up?”

Nico shrugs. “I was getting hungry.”

“You should have knocked. I was just waiting around.” Jason generally didn’t get him until nine, but Nico has a very important appointment that he has to make at around twenty after ten, so it’s time to start his days a little earlier.

“C’mon, let’s go get breakfast.”

Percy isn’t there yet, so they take a seat at the Zeus table. They chatter aimlessly about Capture the Flag, even though Nico knows that very shortly Percy will show up with the news that he has to join their side.

Sure enough very shortly there is a very loud shriek and Percy comes sprinting towards them.

“ _Hide me,_ ” he says, as Nico and Jason survey him in amusement. Percy crouches behind Nico as Annabeth and Piper come around the corner, both of them soaking wet. Piper looks vaguely annoyed, but more like she expected this than anything else – her and Percy’s prank war had been going on since last summer, and it wasn’t the first time an unlucky camper had gotten caught in the crossfire – but there was a big difference between a random camper and your _girlfriend._ Piper looks annoyed and maybe – grudgingly – amused, but Annabeth looks _murderous._

“What did you do?” Jason asks, although it’s not too hard to extrapolate based on the soaking wet girls in front of them and the son of Poseidon crouched behind them.

“I’m not risking my life to protect you if Annabeth attacks,” Nico tells him. Annabeth glares at the three of them, as if Nico had any say in her current situation.

_“Toilet water,”_ Annabeth hisses. Jason winces.

“All in all it wasn’t even that good of a prank,” Piper says. “Using your powers aren’t a prank, if they were I would have used permanent makeup on you _ages_ ago.”

“I was running out of ideas, all right! And I didn’t use my powers, I’ll have you know, I asked Leo to help me rig that up.”

“That’s against the rules!”

“There are no rules in war, McLean!”

“Percy,” Annabeth says in a low voice. “If you want war, I am willing to give you war.” She storms away, and Piper, after giving Percy the two eyes to her fingers look, turns and follows.

“I love you!” Percy calls after Annabeth, who gives him a hand gesture that Chiron would certainly not approve of. Percy stands up and sits down across from Nico. “Can I be on your team for Capture the Flag?”

Nico just laughs.

* * *

At 10:20 Nico excuses himself back to his cabin, before shadow travelling to the place he had found Billy yesterday. Sure enough he sees the huge, hulking figure of the Cyclops, and once again he stabs it easily, watching it disintegrate before turning to the boy huddled up against the wall.

“Are you okay?” He asks. Billy swallows and raises a trembling hand up to wipe some Cyclops off his face.

“He only had one eye,” he says slowly. Nico nods.

“Yeah, he did. I’m Nico.”

Billy stands up straight and looks at Nico’s sword. “I’m Billy. Is that a real sword?”

“Yeah. D’you want to hold it?” Saving a kid from certain death and then letting him hold a deadly weapon is probably the quickest way to earn his trust, Nico thinks.

Billy takes the sword and holds it the same way he had yesterday, as if it were sacred. “Is he going to come back?” He asks, eyeing the pile of former Cyclops.

“Nah. But there are more like that. You know that, don’t you?”

Billy looks up at him. “You’ve seen monsters, too?”

“Tons.”

“And you know how to kill them?”

Nico nods again. “I could teach you how to kill monsters, if you’d like. I can bring you back to my camp.”

Billy looks like he’s ready to go right then and there when he stops and slumps, looking upset. “Alanna said I’m not supposed to go with strangers.”

“Is that your sister?”

“How did you know?”

“I have a sister, too, and she worries about me a lot.”

Billy looks at the ground. “She was supposed to be back by now. She left to go find something to eat.” He looks at where the Cyclops had been again.

“I’ll tell you what, kid. Come with me right now, and I promise I’ll bring you back here. But it’s not safe for you to stay here.”

Billy swallows, and now that Nico knows him better he can see that what he had originally thought to be reluctance about leaving was actually guilt about the fact that he wanted to.

“What kind of camp is it? Like a summer camp? Is it an overnight camp? How many people are there? Does _everyone_ see monsters?”

Here we go. “Is that a yes?”

Billy nods. “How do we get there? Is it in New York? Do you have to pay? Because I don’t have any money. Will I get a sword like yours?”

Nico sighs. “I have a friend who can answer all those, but we have to go now, okay?”

“How long will it take us to get there?”

“Faster than you can blink. Hold on to my arm, okay?”

Once again he goes to move but then holds back and looks at Nico wearily. “I – Alanna always said strangers were bad and that I should never trust anyone but her.”

“That can be good advice. Kind of lonely though, isn’t it?”

Billy looks at his sword wistfully. Nico uses another tactic he had used yesterday. “You can hold my sword again, if you want. That way if anything bad happens you can easily defend yourself.”

This is the thing that tips Billy over, just as he knew it would. “Hold onto that tightly. Don’t drop it.” Billy clutches the sword with white knuckles and then nods when Nico asks if he’s ready.

* * *

“Wow! That was weird! How did you do that? Where are we? Are we still in New York? I’ve never been outside of New York. One time I had a dream I was in California, but when I woke up I was still just in New York.” Nico shoots him a sharp glance. He doesn’t know what this could mean. Were there people who knew what was happening? Or was it just one of those weird child things? Or maybe it had something to do with his parentage.

“We’re still in New York. This is where my camp is.”

“How do you know they’ll take me? Is there a test?”

“Do you see that tree? If you can walk past that tree, you pass.”

Billy studies his face, possibly to see if he was joking, and then handed Nico his sword back before sprinting up the hill. Nico can’t help but feel a little apprehensive, but Billy steps across the boundary with ease. He hurries to catch up to him.

He hadn’t thought he was gone that long, but when he nears his cabin he sees Jason, Will, and Percy milling about anxiously. Will is the first one to notice him – he looks extremely irritated, but then he catches sight of Billy and the look changes to one of confusion.

“Where did you go?”

“Jesus, you three are jumpy. I wasn’t gone that long.”

“You’re kind of the king of disappearing,” Percy says, but he is also focused on the child at Nico’s side, who is studying Will’s bow with interest. “Who is that?”

“This is Billy. I saved him from a Cyclops.”

“So you did leave camp. What for?”

“I was, uh. Hungry.” None of them clearly believe this, but they are more preoccupied with Billy. They will likely drill him later, but Billy takes this lull in the conversation to butt in.

“Do you know how to shoot a bow and arrow?” He asks Will with wonder in his voice. Will blinks, taken aback.

“Um, kind of, I suppose. I’m not that good, but –”

“Cool! Can you teach me? Do you have a sword like Nico? Is it black? Can you –” And off he goes. Will is staring at him in wonder as Billy fires off questions, and Percy raises his eyebrows.

“He’s something, isn’t he?”

“He asks a lot of questions,” Nico says quietly. “It’s exhausting.”

Percy grins at him. “Gee, I wonder what it’s like to have a ten year old constantly follow you around firing questions,” Percy says. “It’s probably really annoying, right?”

Nico rolls his eyes. “Shut up, Percy.”

“Do you think he knows anything about Mythomagic?”

“Shut _up,_ Percy,” he says, although he is fighting back a grin.

“We should take him to Chiron,” Jason says. “Before he breaks Will.”

“Do you fight monsters, too?”

“Uh – I’m a doctor.”

“Really? Wow! Do you have to go to school for that? Do you do surgery? Is there –”

“Hey Billy,” Nico interjects. “I’m going to take you to meet the head of camp, okay? Can you run ahead to Chiron,” he adds, quieter, to Will, “And tell him he should probably use the wheelchair for now?”

Will nods, looking a little thankful to be able to get away from the never-ending barrage of questions. Billy looks undeterred, instead turning his attention to Percy.

“Do you have a sword?”

“Yeah. Do you want to see it?”

Billy is so enthralled by Riptide that he doesn’t speak the whole way to the Big House. “How did you do that?” Nico says in wonder.

“I have experience with annoying children, remember?” He says with a wink.

“You have experience with being annoying,” is Nico’s retort.

* * *

True to Camp Half Blood tradition, Billy is shown the orientation video and then thrown right into Capture the Flag, which, Nico thinks, is a tradition that should probably be revamped.

Billy is put on guard duty with him. He doesn’t bother urging Jason and Percy to slow down – he has a funny feeling that despite the affection he has for the boy, too much isolated time in the forest with him might cause Nico to go insane.

“You didn’t tell me that man was half horse!” Nico opens his mouth to respond to his, but it appears he was not supposed to, because Billy carries on. “He said the Greek and Roman gods are REAL! Isn’t that crazy? He said my mother was a GODDESS. He said I’ll know by the time I’m thirteen who she is. Who’s your mom?”

“Maria di Angelo,” Nico says with a smirk. Billy looks at him with furrowed eyebrows before realization dawns.

“So your dad is a god! Who is he?”

“Hades.”

“Wow! Chiron said he was one of the most powerful gods! Who’s Will’s dad? And Percy? And Jason?”

“Apollo. Poseidon. Zeus.”

“Wow! Do you guys have powers? Is that how we got here? Because of your powers? You said you had a sister, when can I meet her? Do I have powers?”

“It depends who your mother is,” Nico says tiredly.

He is incredibly, incredibly relieved when the horn blows. Billy follows him as he heads out of the forest.

“Chiron said I’ll stay in the Hermes cabin until I’m claimed, I asked if I could stay with you but he said it was against Camp rules –” Nico sends a quick thank you to Chiron – “And that I’ll eat dinner at their table, too, but he said I could sit with you then if I really wanted to.”

Nico sighs, but he is smiling. “Great, kid. Maybe you won’t be able to talk as much with your mouth full.”

“Alanna always said I talked too much. When are we going to go back?”

Nico tells him the idea again, of writing her a note and setting a set time when they’ll go back. This seems to please Billy.

“This means she’s a demigod too, right? So she can come to camp too, right?”

Nico swallows. “Yeah, Billy, it does,” seems to be the safest answer. They walk in silence for a little bit, before Billy finally says, “So what do you eat for dinner?” And that, of course, leads to a whole barrage of questions, which Nico eventually stops listening to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i promise there's more Will from now on :))


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'll be gone from now until the 22nd so there will be no updates since i will be in the middle of the ocean lmao i will upload the next chapter as soon as i return! have a good two weeks y'all

He had planned to sit with Jason at the campfire, because sitting with Will had been what started this whole fucking thing, but as he’s passing the place where the Apollo cabin is sitting Will grabs his sleeve and yanks him down, so he ends up half in his lap.

“Fuck, Solace,” he says, blushing a very violent shade of red and hoping Will wouldn’t notice in the darkness. “A hello would suffice.”

“Hi,” Will says, laughing. “You’re gonna sit with me.”

“Apparently. You could have just asked, you know.”

“That was more fun,” he says, which Nico doesn’t understand, so he doesn’t respond. “Where’s your shadow?”

“I think he’s bothering Jason. I might have let slip that he could fly.”

“You’re diabolical.”

“I needed a break. He doesn’t shut up.”

“He’s young. Life hasn’t broken him yet.”

Nico snorts. “That’s uplifting. You should do pep talks.”

Will leans back on his hands. “He hasn’t been claimed yet?”

“No.”

“Any ideas?”

Nico shrugs. “He doesn’t seem to have any obvious powers, but it’s hard to tell. Unless he starts talking to plants or turns the Stoll brothers into pigs I doubt we’ll find out until he’s claimed.”

Will watches him. “It’s strange. If I didn’t know any better I’d say he was a son of Apollo, even though I know he can’t be. I get this weird vibe from him.”

“He’s certainly annoying enough.”

Will bumps him with his shoulder. “You’d be lost without me and you know it.” Nico figures it is safer to not answer this, so he just leans back, making sure his hands are a safe distance away from Will’s. The campfire is a decent height tonight, a slightly muted gold colour. One of Will’s siblings produces a guitar and Chiron clears his throat for silence.

“Let’s start with ‘This Land is Minos’ Land,’” Kayla says. Nico lets out a groan.

“I fucking hate this song,” he mumbles.

Will sings along, but in every instance where the word ‘Minos’ is used, Will replaces it with ‘fuck face,’ and by the end of the song Nico is laughing so hard he is wheezing.

“You’re going to Asphodel for that, you know that right?”

“Worth it,” Will says. “You’re supposed to sing along, you know.”

“I don’t sing.”

“Oh come on, you can’t be that bad.”

“I didn’t say I _couldn’t_ sing, I just said I don’t. Besides, a dying cat would sound better than you, so I’m not that worried.”

Will is giving him a funny look. “Can you sing?”

“I don’t know. Does it matter?”

“You can sing, can’t you?”

Nico’s face is hot. “Everyone can technically sing, Solace.”

“Oh my _gods,_ you can sing, can’t you? Sing for me!”

“You’re out of your fucking mind.”

Will’s face is lit up and he grabs Nico’s shoulder, shaking him back and forth. “Please? Come on Nico, I want to hear you sing!”

“I would rather die.”

Will sighs rather overdramatically and slumps against him. “Fine, then I’m going to sing really loudly.”

Nico groans and tries to shove him off of him. “Don’t fucking start with me, Will.”

Will launches into ‘Down by the Aegean,’ very loudly and very off key in Nico’s ear, and Will grabs him and drags him back to his side when Nico leans away.

This, Nico thinks, as Will wraps an arm around him and presses his lips almost directly up to Nico’s ear, is exactly what he was supposed to not be doing. That night when he goes to bed he removes the light as usual, and he dreams of lips pressed to his ear, to his throat, to his mouth.

* * *

He isn’t surprised, when he wakes up, to see that the light fixture is back in place. He hadn’t really expected anything else.

Today, he thinks, remembering lips near his ear and an arm tight around him, he will talk to Annabeth and Piper – maybe even Percy, if he’s desperate – and he’ll start doing whatever Aphrodite wants him to do. He’ll start getting over Will.

It’s not like this is getting him anywhere.

* * *

“Can you get Piper and meet me in your cabin?”

Jason stops from where he had been walking towards him. “Uh, sure. Why?”

“I have to talk to you guys.”

Jason shrugs. “Sure,” he says, before heading off towards the Aphrodite cabin, as Nico heads to Athena’s.

He manages to intercept Annabeth just as she’s coming out. “Hi. I was about to go get Piper.”

“Yeah, you might not want to. A little birdie told me Percy’s next prank might make some sacrifices in the name of war. Besides, I need your help.”

Annabeth had made an annoyed face at the news of Percy’s prank, but when Nico asks for help she studies him briefly before nodding. As they are heading back towards Jason’s, they hear a distant shriek.

“That was probably it,” Nico says. Annabeth shakes her head.

“One of these days I’m going to play one giant prank on the two of them to get them to stop.”

“Please include me when you do,” Nico says with a smirk.

Nico joins Jason and Piper in Jason's cabin, and they both look up in anticipation when he enters. “What’s going on?” Jason asks. “Are you okay?”

Honestly, who needed a mother when you had Jason Grace.

Piper and Jason are sitting on his bed, and Annabeth sits down on the other. Nico remains standing.

“What I’m about to say is going to sound really ridiculous, but I want to remind you that we just fought a war against Mother Earth.”

Piper smiles, and Nico takes a deep breath.

“I have been living the same day for about a week now.”

All three pairs of eyebrows knit together. “What do you mean?” Annabeth says.

And so he explains. He starts on the original July 22nd, and even though Jason’s jaw tightens when Nico explains what he had been planning on doing, he doesn’t interrupt. Annabeth and Piper don’t look all that surprised when he talks about Will, which leads him to believe that maybe he’s not quite as subtle as he assumed, which is a horrifying thought. He tells them about Aphrodite and Caerus, and then he explains about waking up the next morning and having the day be the same. He tells them about trying to outrun Aphrodite, and then about his conversation with his father, then he tells Jason that this is the second time he’d been told this.

“That’s how you knew Percy’s prank got me,” Annabeth says. Nico nods.

“And in about – what time is it?” Annabeth checks her phone.

“8:45.”

“In about an hour and a half I have to go save a kid named Billy from a Cyclops.”

Jason lets out a whistle. “Gods.”

Piper is shaking her head. “I’m sorry, Nico.”

“It’s hardly your fault,” he says.

“Yeah, Pipes,” Jason says reassuringly. “If we had to apologize for every shitty thing our parents did I would never stop.”

Nico casts an uneasy look at the statue of Zeus.

“I know, but still. This isn’t cheating on your wife – which, still bad, but she’s literally messing around with time! That should be against the rules.”

“The gods aren’t very good at rules, I think Percy and Thalia are pretty good examples of that.”

“I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what the hell Aphrodite wants from me. Hence you two,” he says. “You know your mother,” he says, nodding at Piper. “And you know everything,” he says to Annabeth, who blushes slightly and smiles.

“Well,” she says. “Obviously it has something to do with your love life. Aphrodite doesn’t deal in anything else.”

“That’s what Jason said, last time.”

“This is _weird,”_ Jason says. Nico glares at him.

“How do you think I feel?”

“Which means she either wants you to try again, with Will, or she wants you to find someone else.”

Nico sits down next to Annabeth and puts his head in his hands. He needs the help, obviously, because he is at a complete loss what to do, but it’s embarrassing, talking to them all about this. He finds he can’t quite make eye contact.

“Will made it clear that he wasn’t interested,” he mutters. “So it’s not the first one.” He finds that, for some reason, saying Will’s name in front of them is utterly mortifying.

When he looks up Piper looks confused. “That doesn’t make any sense to me,” she says, half to herself. “I feel –”

“It doesn’t matter,” he says, perhaps a little too harshly. “I don’t want to talk about him anymore.”

“Okay,” Annabeth says. “So it’s the second option.”

“How the fuck does Aphrodite expect me to find someone else when no one other than me can remember the days?”

“That’s probably what makes this so fun for her,” Piper says bitterly. “She probably wants to prove that love can overcome all obstacles, or some bullshit like that.”

“So what, time to pick random people and try to get them to fall in love with the weirdest kid in camp in 24 fucking hours?”

“You’re not the weirdest kid in camp,” Piper says.

“Yeah, that new Hecate girl is definitely weirder and more off-putting than you ever were.” Piper glares at Jason, but Nico laughs slightly.

“Maybe she doesn’t want you to get that far,” Annabeth interjects. “Maybe she just wants to force you to get over – you know who.”

“In 24 hours?” Jason asks. Annabeth shrugs.

“Maybe she just wants you to start the process of getting over him.”

“It just doesn’t seem like the kind of thing Aphrodite would _do,”_ he says. He turns to Piper. “You know your mother. Would she put this much effort to try and make me fall out of love, so to speak?”

Piper shakes her head. “The only way I can see her doing that would be if there was someone else you were ignoring in favour of – you know who. You know, like somebody who is interested in you but you don’t see it because of your… current feelings.”

Nico lets out an angry breath. “Great, so all I have to do is find someone who’s been harbouring a secret fucking crush on the second weirdest kid at camp.”

“We can make a list,” Annabeth offers. “If we organize this properly and mark down all the guys at camp we’ll be able to hopefully create a shortlist of people we think it could be, as well as eliminating the ones it probably isn’t. That way even if we don’t figure out anything today you’ll still have a vague idea and you can keep trying without telling us over and over again. I’ll be right back, we have graphing paper in my cabin.”

“Of course you do,” Nico mutters.

* * *

“Okay,” Annabeth says, spreading the sheet over a table she had pulled out of the back of the cabin (“How did you know that was there?”). “Let’s begin by thinking of the guys in camp that are above the age of, say, 14, and below the age of 18.”

Everyone – except Nico, who is wondering how the fuck he got into this situation – starts putting out names, and eventually they decide they probably have everyone. “Okay, we should start with crossing some people out. We’ll start with Percy, Jason, and Leo.”

Nico literally wants to sink into the ground. And that’s a thing he can do. He’s wondering if it’s worth desecrating the Zeus cabin when there’s a knock on the door.

“Hey, Jason, you in there?”

Everyone turns to look at Nico, who just nods. Might as well get Percy in on it, too. Why the fuck not.

After a quick debriefing (“Man, you’d think one of these days they’d just leave us alone”) Percy gets involved in the graphing.

“I think we can probably mark the Stoll brothers as straight.”

“I don’t know, I think I definitely saw Connor checking out Jason’s ass once,” Percy says.

“I haven’t said more than three words to Connor Stoll,” Nico objects sullenly. Jason is contemplating Percy’s statement.

“Really? Do I have a nice ass?”

“I like it,” Piper says with a smirk.

“We’re getting off topic,” Annabeth says in her best ‘listen to me’ voice. “I will put Connor Stoll down as a maybe. What about Clovis?”

“I don’t think Clovis has been awake long enough to consider his sexuality.”

“You’re friends with him though, aren’t you?” Percy asks. Nico gives a noncommittal shrug.

“We see each other in dreams occasionally. Not like that!” He adds, when the four of them burst into huge grins almost at the same time. It’s quite eerie. “And it hasn’t really happened since the war. Stop looking at me like that!”

“We’ll put Clovis in the ‘yes’ column.”

Nico groans. “I hate everything.” He checks Annabeth’s cellphone, deciding he’d rather deal with Billy’s never ending line of questioning than figure out whether Austin from the Apollo cabin would be a possible option for Nico (Nico doesn’t bother to say that even if Austin was even remotely interested, there is no way in hell that Nico would ever date one of Will’s brothers).

“Okay, next is…” when Annabeth trails off Nico checks the list and sees _Will_ written in Annabeth’s neat writing. He swallows.

“Put him in the no column. I have to go get Billy.”

“Who’s Billy?” Percy whispers to Jason. Nico debates saying something, but ultimately he can’t think of anything, and he doesn’t want to stay any longer in this room with all of them looking at him with pity. So instead he just melts into the shadows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annabeth Chase as all-knowing president of the universe all those in favour say aye 
> 
> this is kind of cliffhangy i promise i didn't plan that hahahahaha bye for two weeks i'm sorry


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SURPRISE this place has wifi here's one more chapter before I go on my cruise where there is definitely no wifi
> 
> The format is a little wonky because I'm posting this from my phone I'll fix it when I get home next week

He’s a little early – it’s barely ten – so he sits down on the edge of a potted plant and takes a breath.

He doesn’t want to go back. He doesn’t want to rank the guys in camp and force himself to have feelings for them. Nico doesn’t know a whole lot about love, but he knows that’s not how it works. If it was he wouldn’t have spent four years of his life pining after Percy Jackson. If Will isn’t interested that’s fine (not _really,_ but he’ll manage), but there’s no way he’s going to be able to just force himself to get over him. That’s not how it worked. It took him ages to even realize he had feelings for Will, and now he’s supposed to do that all over with another person in 24 hours? That’s not how feelings _worked,_ and Aphrodite had to know that.

He thinks back to what Piper had said, about someone else in camp possibly having feelings for him. He didn’t really think that was a possibility, but to be fair that might just be his recently rejected self-esteem talking. Maybe Aphrodite was trying to push him towards whoever that was, if indeed he even existed.

He remembers what she had said – she had called him slippery. He thinks about all the effort he had put in, trying to run away, and thinks he probably knows what she was talking about.

He doesn’t want to do it – he doesn’t want to do any of it.

But he has learned over the years that the gods don’t really put much store into what you didn’t want to do. If they did he would probably still be in the casino, with Bianca, and he wouldn’t have had to deal with any of this, with Percy Jackson or Will Solace or two wars or almost killing himself to cross the world with a giant statue. Bianca would still be here.

Honestly, it’s enough to almost make him want to go back to the Lotus, but Aphrodite would still be able to get him, and he’s not really willing to give up his consciousness and slip into a video game filled haze, forgetting everything else.

And anyway, he thinks, it’s not like everything that happened to him after he left the casino had been bad. He had Hazel, now, for one, not to mention his half best friend/half mother figure Jason Grace. He could finally look Percy in the eye, now, and he thinks Leo has finally stopped being afraid of him – mostly, at least. Every other Saturday he went to New Rome to play Mythomagic with Frank. And regardless of everything else, Will was a good friend.

There’s the shriek, and Nico springs up.

* * *

It’s basically the same script – Nico kills the Cyclops, Billy stares in wonder at his sword, and with a little push and a promise to take him back to leave a message for his sister, Billy holds his sword while he holds Billy, shadow travelling right back into Jason’s cabin where, sure enough, everyone is still clustered around the chart.

“Wow!” Billy exclaims when they emerge.

“Wow,” Annabeth mutters.

“This is Billy,” he says, rather unnecessarily. “Billy, this is Annabeth, Percy, Jason, and Piper.”

“How did we get here? Was it magic? Can you do magic? Are these your friends? Can _they_ do magic?”

Nico sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. Percy is laughing. “Is this what it’s like every day?”

Nico nods.

“What’s that?” Billy asks, looking at the chart on the table. Annabeth gathers it up rather quickly.

“Nothing,” Nico says firmly. “Come on, Billy. You have to meet Chiron.”

“Who’s Chiron?”

“It’s a long story. Come on.” He avoids everyone else’s eyes as Annabeth folds up the paper, and eventually they all follow him back outside. Billy is still holding his sword. Nico doesn’t bother to ask for it back.

They are nearing the Big House when Will shows up. “I was wondering where you were,” he says. Nico can feel everyone looking at him, which might be a little bit obvious, not to mention very annoying, but luckily Will is preoccupied by Billy. “Why is there a small child holding your sword?”

“I’m not that small!” Billy shouts back defensively. Will’s eyebrows shoot up and he stares at Nico, who just shrugs.

“Long story.”

“Where did he _come_ from?”

Nico looks at Billy. “Where are you from, kid?”

“Brooklyn.”

He looks up at Will. “He’s from Brooklyn.”

“That’s not what I meant and you know it.”

“I found him, Will, okay? I have to go find Chiron.” He walks past him into the Big House. Billy turns around to look back.

“Who was that?”

“That’s Will.”

“He looks mad at you.”

Nico smirks. “He probably is.”

Chiron is in full horse form when Nico finds him, which he had completely forgotten about, so distracted about the situation to remember that a young child who had just faced death at the hands of a monster probably wouldn’t be able to distinguish between bad monsters and, well – Chiron. Billy’s first instinct, luckily, isn’t to use the sword that he is still holding, but instead to hide behind Nico, like he did when Reyna was yelling.

“Is he like the other one?” Billy whispers. At first it’s hard for him to understand how Chiron could look even remotely threatening – he looked like an old history professor even when he was literally half fucking horse – but he supposes when you’ve grown up under the belief that anything that didn’t look human was probably trying to kill you, you’re likely to be a little skittish.

“No. This is Chiron. He’s the boss, sort of.”

Chiron gives him the same look that Will did, before turning his attention to Billy. “Hello. What’s your name?” At Nico’s nod, Billy answers him. Nico goes into a quick rundown – Chiron doesn’t ask him why he had left camp, although he doesn’t look particularly happy about it, and Nico thinks he’s probably going to get a talking to later.

He has to stay with Billy through the whole process, including the orientation video (which, he thinks, is really outdated, and that was coming from someone who was himself rather outdated). Chiron tells him the whole spiel about the gods and how his mother was one of them, and that sometime within the next two years he will be claimed, but for now he’ll sleep in the Hermes cabin, who was the god of yada yada yada, etc etc etc.

And then it’s time for Capture the Flag. Billy should technically be playing with the Hermes cabin, but he looks utterly terrified about doing so and Chiron eventually relents, just for this first time, to let him stay with Nico.

“Hey, who wins this game?” Jason whispers to him as they’re setting up, and he’s about to answer when he notices the lack of Percy.

Oh.

“Originally Annabeth got caught in Percy’s prank and she kicked him off their side, and you and him got the flag, but now… I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

Despite everything, he’s beginning to get a little excited. With Percy on the other side it’s decided that he’ll stick with Jason, who will take advantage of the Ares’ diversion, while Hephaestus’ cabin will set up traps around their base to help out the guards, that girl from the Iris cabin and –

Billy looks utterly fucking terrified, and Nico wonders when he became such a huge fucking sap.

“I’ll take guard duty with Billy,” he says, trying not to sound too torn up over it. Billy looks immensely relieved, and Jason gives him a rueful smile.

They all disperse. Billy asks a lot of questions about Capture the Flag, and Nico answers as many of them as possible with one word answers. Billy looks slightly ridiculous in the armor, and his sword is too big for him, but he had been utterly thrilled when it had been handed to him, as most ten year olds were when handed a very sharp, very dangerous object.

Silence settles over them, and this is strange enough that Nico knows that means there’s probably something bothering him. He looks over; Billy is staring at his sword.

“What’s wrong?”

“I’m just thinking about what Alanna would say if she saw me with this. I think she would probably yell at me. She would probably yell at you, too.”

Nico smiles slightly. “She kind of sounds like my sister.”

“You have a sister?”

Nico nods. “Her name is Hazel. She lives in California. But I think your sister sounds a lot like my other sister.”

“You have two sisters?”

Nico sighs. “Yeah. My other sister was Bianca, but she’s dead, now.”

Billy is very quiet. When he looks over he is staring at the sword again. “How did she die?”

“She was killed by a giant robot.”

And here’s the thing – Nico has never said that out loud. Sure, he’s said _my sister died_ or _I lost my sister_ or _my sister died on a quest_ but he’s never really said that, never even thought of it, really, but it was true, that was what had happened, Bianca had been crushed by a giant robot. And that in and of itself is not even remotely funny, but that combined with everything else that has ever happened to him – his life was a mess. His life was a fucking _mess._ It was utterly, utterly ridiculous. And so he starts laughing. He leans back against a tree and he laughs because he has been living the same day over for a week and he was born in the thirties but he is only sixteen years old and he spent fifty odd years as a ten year old and his sister was _killed by a giant robot_ and he can’t quite believe that this is his life.

“Welcome to life as a demigod, Billy,” he says when he has caught his breath. “Nothing makes any goddamn sense.”

* * *

Just before the campfire starts, he asks Piper once again if he could use the shrine in the Aphrodite cabin’s bathroom.

“How did you know it was in the – oh. You’ve done this before, I imagine?”

It is easier now, since most people are outside, but Piper still stands guard. He shuts the bathroom door behind him and tries not to wrinkle his nose at the smells inside. The perfumes probably all smelled really good on their own, but all the smells mixed together were an onslaught of stench.

He looks at the shrine and takes a deep breath.

“I don’t want to leave, anymore. Is that what you wanted me to realize? That there are different kinds of love, and that just because someone doesn’t love you the way you wanted them to doesn’t mean they don’t love you? That I still have Jason and Reyna and Percy and everyone else, all these friends I didn’t use to have? That this is where I’m supposed to be? Because I get it. These people are my friends and they love me and I _get it._ I won’t try to leave again. I don’t _want_ to. And if this isn’t what you want from me then I don’t know what to do.” He sighs. “I know you said you weren’t going to show up again but I just – I think I understand.”

He stares at it for bit longer before nodding and turning back, but as he turns towards the door he stop in his tracks.

There is writing on the mirror in what looks like lipstick.

_Not the lesson I intended, but a good one nonetheless. Keep searching, Nico di Angelo._

He resists the urge to trash the bathroom and instead sits down, slumping against the wall. After a few minutes Piper knocks on the door, and when he doesn’t answer she opens it slowly, carefully. She sees the message on the mirror first before she sees him, head pressed into his knees, and then she sinks down next to him.

“I guess it didn’t turn out like you had wanted?”

“Why is she doing this to me,” he says, muffled against his knees. Piper touches his arm tentatively.

“I don’t know, Nico. But if whatever you tried today didn’t work… I know it’s not what you want but I really do think you should try the ideas we came up with today. I know you don’t want to, but maybe if you just appease my mother she’ll let you out of this and then you can stop. Annabeth still has that list. You should look at it before you go to bed. It’ll disappear tomorrow.”

“She’s holding me captive and forcing me to do something I don’t want to do. What is she going to do if I never figure it out? Keep the world like this forever? Am I going to age? If I throw myself off a fucking cliff can she override that, too?”

He doesn’t need to look up to know that Piper is looking at him sadly. “We’ll figure it out, Nico.”

He’s seriously beginning to doubt it.

“I better go find Annabeth,” he mutters. “If your mother is so fucking set on me getting over Will I might as well start trying.”

“Nico,” she adds before he can leave, “I know this isn’t what you want to hear, and I know it doesn’t help, but I – it doesn’t make sense to me that he would have rejected you. I can _feel_ feelings, I can sense them, and Will – whenever you two are together I get the same vibe coming off of him as I do from you.”

She was right – he didn’t want to hear this. “Maybe you’re just defective, McLean,” he mutters, before realizing that wasn’t fair. “Sorry,” he adds. “But if it makes you feel better you’ll forget that I said that tomorrow.”

“You will ask us for help again, right? You won’t try to do this by yourself?”

“I don’t really have a choice, Piper. Obviously I can’t do this alone.”

She smiles at him. “I know this is the kind of obnoxious cliché that Jason probably tells you every other day, but you’re not alone. We all care about you.”

This is awkward. Nico has never had this long of a conversation with Piper one on one, and definitely never one this… touchy.

“You’re right, Jason usually says that to me at least three times a week.”

She laughs and loops her arm through his, which is _also_ awkward, but he would be lying if he said it wasn’t nice. He wonders if Piper has the ability to calm people down, or if there’s just something about being near her that makes you think she has things under control. “C’mon, we’ll be late for the campfire,” she says, dragging him out of the cabin.

He sits with her and Jason, Percy and Annabeth. Leo does the usual thing whenever there’s a new camper and launches himself into the fire, which Billy (after he’s done screaming) finds _fascinating,_ and Leo gestures at him wildly for help a few times during the line of questioning, but Nico smirks and pretends not to see. They sing that stupid song about Minos again, and Will, from across the fire, noticeably does not sing along to that one, and Nico shoots him a thankful smile. He is smushed between Piper and Jason, who rock him back and forth in tune with the songs, much to his chagrin, but by the end of the night not even he can keep a smile off his face.

“I’m sorry we won’t remember tomorrow,” Jason says to him when it’s done and they’re heading back to their cabins. Nico shrugs. He had reluctantly spent a great deal of time looking at Annabeth’s final list to try and remember the names. He’ll try it out, if that’s really what Aphrodite wants. Rather that then be stuck doing this day over for the rest of his life.

“It’s fine. You helped a lot today. I’ll end up telling you again, anyway.”

“Make sure you do. I’ll see you this morning,” he says, with a clap on the back and a grin. Nico rolls his eyes and heads to bed, removing the light once again, although he knows that his revelation from today wasn’t enough for Aphrodite.

Oh well. It was enough for him.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELLO I am back sort of I'm in Orlando and I'm going to post another chapter from my phone bc tomorrow is going to be a busy day bc I have to fly home and then I have to go to the hospital bc I literally...........cannot walk without crying?????? Idek what's wrong with me and then I have school and I am just! So busy! So forgive me for another wonky format I will fix it when I am back to my computer
> 
> edit: i've fixed up the chapter so everything should be good now

They had decided, much to his chagrin, that Clovis was the best option.

“You guys have history,” Percy had said. “You _dream_ about each other.”

“There’s a reason I didn’t originally include you in this, you know,” he had said sullenly.

The short list was, well – pretty short. On it was Clovis, Shane from the Hephaestus cabin (Nico had once asked him to pass him a marshmallow – apparently that meant they were meant to be), Connor Stoll (Nico had fought against this, but they were vehement), Annabeth’s brother Malcolm (“he’s really nice” “oh great”), and one of Piper’s brothers, Ian. They had wanted to put Austin on the list, but Nico had utterly refused.

He makes the decision to nix Shane and Ian off the list, because he has literally no history with them at all, and he refuses to try and date someone based solely on the fact that “Leo said Shane gave him vibes,” and “Ian came out last summer.” That left Clovis, Connor Stoll, and Malcolm.

Great.

Nico did not want to do this. Nico was not interested in Clovis, who was awake maybe a grand total of three hours a day, or in Connor Stoll, who once stuck a whoopee cushion in Nico’s sleeping bag when he had stayed in the Hermes cabin when he first came to camp, or in Malcolm, who Nico barely knows and who is, like Annabeth, intimidatingly smart.

But Nico also does not want to relive this day over for the rest of his life.

The other problem, though, is that Nico does not know how to flirt. Nico barely even knows how to talk to people. And while ever since he cut his hair little old ladies have kept coming up to him to pinch his cheeks and talk about how handsome he was (he always had to bite back a comment about how he was probably older than them), he isn’t exactly comfortable enough in his body – or in his sexuality – to just randomly go up to, say, Connor Stoll, and try and figure out if he is secretly in love with Nico.

Why couldn’t his life have been normal?

* * *

When it is time to get Billy he excuses himself from Jason under the pretense of heading back to his cabin. He runs through the same shtick with Billy as usual; honestly he’s starting to feel a little sorry for this Cyclops, who has to keep getting run through with a sword day after day. He tells Jason and Percy to slow it down, Billy talks his ear off, and he – blissfully – gets to sink Drew in dirt again. He is cornered by Will and his friends again, but this time instead of heading off with Cecil after the horn blows Lou Ellen starts staring at him with her eyes narrowed.

“What are you looking at?” He asks her nervously. She takes a step closer to him.

“You have magic _oozing_ out of you,” she says. “You’re practically dripping with it.”

Nico doesn’t really know what this means. Sure, he has an idea as to why this probably is, but he isn’t sure what someone looked like when they were _oozing_ with magic. Nico didn’t want to be _oozing_ with anything.

“Oh,” is what he says. Lou Ellen takes another step forward, and Nico takes a step back, closer to Will, who has climbed down from his tree.

“Are you fucking around with magic, di Angelo?” She says accusingly. He knows she isn’t trying to be mean; Lou Ellen had always been nice to him, but Hecate kids were very, very particular about magic. “That’s dangerous shit.”

“I haven’t done anything,” he says, which is true. She didn’t ask him if a crazy love goddess was fucking around with magic, so he doesn’t have to lie.

She looks like she doesn’t believe him, and she opens her mouth to say something when Will snaps, “He said he hasn’t done anything Lou, gods. Why would he be playing around with magic, anyway?” Will’s voice is astonishingly close to his ear, and when he turns around he sees that they are closer than he had thought.

Lou Ellen rolls her eyes and mumbles something to Cecil, who laughs. Nico shifts uncomfortably from foot to foot, conscious of the laughter he thinks is directed at him, but Will grabs his arm. “C’mon,” he mutters. “Lou’s just in a bad mood because she thinks it’s unfair that children of the Big Three are on the same team. Which, you know, it totally is,” he says with a smile. Nico rolls his eyes.

“I was on guard duty with an eleven year old.”

“Yeah, where did he come from?”

“Well I imagine about eleven years ago his father and some big fancy goddess of Olympus got together and did the adult dance and then –”

“The _adult dance?”_

Nico turns red. “I, that’s, I mean… that’s what Bianca always called it,” he finally says dejectedly. Will laughs loudly, hand still clutching Nico’s arm.

“That’s the cutest thing I’ve ever heard, di Angelo, gods. Is that how she gave you the talk? Through dance euphemisms?”

“You’re the worst, Solace,” he mutters to the ground, trying to wrench his arm out of Will’s grasp, but Will just yanks him to him and grabs his other hand, as if they were about to do the waltz. “What are you doing?”

“Do you know how to dance? Do you know the dances from Pride and Prejudice and shit?”

“I was born in the 30s, Will, not the nineteenth fucking century. Would you let go of my hand?”

“Let’s dance.”

“You’re fucked.” But Will is stronger than he looks, and he is hauling Nico around, humming some sort of tune. It’s almost funny, really – Nico was supposed to be falling for someone else but here he was, dancing with Will fucking Solace. Will pulls him closer and tries to dip him.

“Will!”

Will cackles as Nico wrenches away from him, blushing a furious shade of red. When he turns away he sees Jason and Percy a few feet away, watching him with stupid grins on their faces. Nico firmly ignores them.

Will follows after him, humming incessantly.

* * *

At dinner that night Nico is distracted. Jason and Percy prattle on beside him but the only thing he can focus on is the way it had felt to be pressed up against Will, and his breath in his ear as he hummed, and their interlocked fingers. It’s distracting, to say the least. Not least because he was supposed to be focusing on other people.

He forces himself to focus on the way Will had pulled away from him and ran instead of the way he had laughed in Nico’s ear as he dipped him, and he makes a decision.

* * *

“Hey, Clovis,” he says at the bonfire that night, sitting down next to him. Clovis jerks awake.

“Nico,” he says with a yawn. “What’s up?”

Will is looking at him funny from across the fire. So, for that matter, are Jason and Percy. Billy is sitting with the Hermes cabin and is watching the fire in amazement.

“You don’t normally come to these,” Nico says. This is awkward, not because he didn’t get along with Clovis – he did – but because he knows that he is not doing this to be friendly.

“Chiron said I needed to be more involved in camp activities,” he says. Clovis has this strange way of speaking where he talks in a slow drawl, and more than once he has drifted off in the middle of a sentence.

“Chiron had that talk with me once,” Nico mutters. Clovis grins lazily at him.

There is a scream from the direction of the Hermes cabin and Nico looks up to see Leo in front of Billy, flames licking up his body. He rolls his eyes as Billy looks on in horror.

“It’s not as funny when you’ve seen it for the fifth time,” he says, as Leo douses himself and explains to a panic stricken Billy that no, it was okay, he was fireproof, see? Nico looks over when Clovis doesn’t answer to see him fast asleep.

Nico sighs and stands up.

* * *

When he sits down beside Billy, Leo looks at him thankfully. Nico doesn’t bother to tell him that he isn’t doing this for him.

“Nico! Did you _see_ that? He can set himself on fire! I think that’s even cooler than your power!”

Leo grins at him. Nico sticks his tongue out.

“Do you think I’ll have powers like that?”

“Dunno, kid,” Leo tells him. “I can set you on fire if you want, we can see if you’re a son of Hephaestus.”

“Okay!” Billy says in that excited way kids do, without even thinking about the consequences. Nico rolls his eyes.

“Your mother was a goddess, Billy, not your dad, and even if you were, it’s not likely that you’ll be fireproof.”

“He’s right, yo. Your Uncle Leo is something of a messiah around here. I even died, once.”

“Uncle Leo?” He mouths. Leo shrugs, while Billy starts peppering him with questions.

Nico locates the Stoll brothers out of the corner of his eye. They have their heads together and are whispering. Nico can’t even fucking tell which one is Connor.

He nixes Connor Stoll right then and there, and a few minutes later, when everyone who had been chomping on marshmallow’s finds their mouths are stuck shut, Nico is glad.

* * *

Okay, so Malcolm. Malcolm would have been the best choice anyway. He was awake most of the day, which made him a better option than Clovis, and he wasn’t related to the Stoll’s, which makes him a better option than, well, either Stoll’s.

He was pretty good looking, too, and Annabeth had told him that he was bisexual, which obviously meant that they were soulmates.

Luckily Annabeth is sitting next to him, so he can make his way over there without seeming too suspicious. “Hey, Nico,” she says, as he sits next to her. He nods and then leans slightly across her to say hi to her brother.

“Hi. Malcolm, right?”

If Annabeth thinks it’s odd that he is randomly introducing himself to her brother, she does not show it. She does, however, glare in the direction of the Stoll’s and says, “Malcolm was enjoying himself to the marshmallows.” Malcolm nods at him sullenly.

And if that’s not a sign from the gods, Nico doesn’t know what the fuck is.

* * *

Somehow, he finds himself sitting next to Will again. He doesn’t remember why. He had left Annabeth and had wandered, thinking about how much the gods hated him, remembering when his life was simple, and his feet must have led him back to Will.

Stupid feet. Didn’t they know he was supposed to be _avoiding_ Will?

“You look exhausted,” Will says worriedly. “Are you okay?”

Nico lies down on the grass and throws his arm over his eyes. “Do you ever get the feeling that the gods are all just sitting up there, laughing at you?”

He can’t see Will’s face, but he can hear the confusion in his voice. “Uh. Maybe?”

Nico sighs. He suddenly feels Will lie down next to him, body pressed against his, and his breath gets caught in his throat.

“Are you sure you’re all right?” Will asks again. His voice is quiet and concerned, surprisingly close to his ear. Nico struggles to control his breathing.

“I’m just tired, Will.”

Will’s fingers curl around his wrist. He assumes he’s checking something, his pulse, maybe, or trying to figure out if he’s been shadow travelling too much, but he doesn’t say anything, and he doesn’t move away. Eventually his hand slips down into Nico’s.

_Pull away,_ he tells himself.

He doesn’t. He thinks he might fall asleep, actually, because a few minutes later (he thinks) Will is gently shaking him.

“Campfire’s over, sleepy head,” he says. The dying fire is throwing light across his face. Nico groans and sits up. “Are you sleeping enough?”

“Don’t start with me.”

“That’s a serious question. Do you need help sleeping?”

“No, Will. I am sleeping enough.” _The problem is that sleeping doesn’t get me anywhere._

Will narrows his eyes at him. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” he says in exasperation. Will sighs but backs off.

“All right. I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

Nico doesn’t laugh, although he wants to. “Yeah, okay.”

Nico heads back to his cabin, removes his light, and then crawls into bed.

It isn’t fair, he thinks. _Will_ isn’t fair. He’s remembering the way he always held his hand and he thinks it isn’t fair, at all, the way Will does this to him. How is he supposed to get over him when this keeps happening? When Will keeps dragging him back?

He closes his eyes. He doesn’t want to think anymore, not about Will, not about Aphrodite, not about anything. He just wants to go to sleep.

So he does.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i've fixed up the last two chapters so that they are now formatted properly with the proper italics in place
> 
> thank you guys for all your concern about my ankles! on the bright side i don't have rheumatoid arthritis! on the other hand i still don't know what the hell is wrong with me so that was six hours spent at the er for nothing

When morning comes and the day resets Nico knows he can’t have another day of trying to figure out what is happening in his life. He doesn’t want to talk to Jason and everyone again, he doesn’t want to spend the day trying to figure out another guy he was supposed to fall for, and he didn’t want to face Will again, not after last night. So Nico decides to do something he doesn’t think he has ever willingly wanted to do – spend time with his father.

He leaves his cabin shortly before Jason is supposed to get him. He has time to kill before he has to save Billy, so he sets up in a coffee shop near the alley. He had had the sense of mind to grab the stash of mortal money he had before leaving, so he buys breakfast, grabs a newspaper, borrows a pen from one of the baristas, and keeps his eyes on the clock. The crossword and a rather mediocre breakfast sandwich occupies him sufficiently until 10:20 (he’s not very good at crosswords), when he returns the pen and heads back to where Billy would be.

Honestly he’s not in the mood to deal with Billy right now, especially since, unless Aphrodite gets a shred of pity (ha!), the day is just going to reset again. So he stabs the Cyclops and then, instead of doing the old, caring, _you almost died are you okay,_ he says, “Your name is Billy. You don’t have a home. You have a sister named Alanna who’s been missing for two and a half weeks. And you see monsters like that a lot.”

Billy stares at him, and for the first time he looks afraid of Nico. Nico is used to people looking afraid of him, but for some reason this is different.

“How do you know that?”

“Would you believe me if I told you that I could tell the future?”

Billy looks at the pile of Cyclops dust. “Yeah.”

“Well you’d be wrong. But I can tell the past. Sort of. Do you trust me?”

Billy swallows. “I –”

“Alanna said you shouldn’t trust strangers, right?” Billy nods. “But I know all these things about you, which means I’m not really a stranger, am I?”

_Manipulating children. Are you happy, Aphrodite?_

“I guess not.”

“I’m going to take you to my camp, okay? You’ll be safe there, and you’ll meet people like you, and you’ll even learn how to fight things like that.” He nods at the dust. “We’ll come back to look for your sister. Hold my sword. Ready to go?”

Billy doesn’t look ready for anything, really, but he takes Nico’s sword and grips it tightly, and he nods when Nico asks if he can hold onto his arm.

When they emerge near Half Blood Hill Billy opens his mouth to gush, but Nico cuts him off. “Go up that hill, past that tree. You’ll see a camp down there. Ask the first person you meet to take you to Chiron. Got it?”

Billy nods.

“My name is Nico. When a boy named Jason inevitably comes up to you to ask you about me, tell him I needed to go visit my father and I’ll be back later. Can you do that?”

Billy nods. He looks eager.

“Okay. Carry on.” Billy bounds up the hill and Nico sighs, fading back into shadow and reappearing in the Underworld a few seconds later.

* * *

“Hello, Nico,” his father drawls.

“Hello, Father. How’s _Steel Magnolias?”_

Hades scowls. “I don’t want to talk about it,” he says. Nico laughs. “So what are you doing here today, Nico? Here for more love advice?”

“No offence, Father, but I wouldn’t really go to you for love advice if I needed it. You did kind of kidnap your wife.”

Hades rolls his eyes. “If it makes you feel any better, I’m regretting it,” he mutters. “If I have to see Dolly Parton one more time I might just kill myself. She’s Apollo’s daughter, you know. I have yet to meet a child of his that I wasn’t annoyed by.” Nico must betray something in his face, because Hades peers at him. “Why are you making that face?”

“I’m not making a face.”

“You are, you’re making a face. And I imagine it doesn’t have to do with Dolly Parton. What happened?”

“Again, no offence, but I really don’t want to discuss this with you.”

Hades makes an irritated noise. “So love, then. Is that what got everyone in this mess? You and one of his wretched offspring?”

“Could be worse,” Nico says. He is bright red – this talk was probably awkward enough with normal parents. “Could be a son of Zeus.”

Hades scowls. It bears a remarkable resemblance to Nico’s own scowl; he doesn’t know how he feels about this. “You could do better.”

“You don’t even know who I’m talking about.”

Hades narrows his eyes at him. “It can’t be going well, I imagine, or we wouldn’t be having our current troubles.”

“I didn’t come here to talk about boys with you, Father,” Nico mutters. This was utterly mortifying.

“Why did you come?”

“I just needed a day away,” he says. “And you’re the only other person who knows what’s going on.”

“I’m honoured,” Hades says, not sounding honoured at all. “Does that mean you will join us for _Steel Magnolias?”_

Despite everything, Nico smiles. “Sure. It can’t be that bad, can it?”

“Watch it seven times in a row and then get back to me,” his father says sullenly.

* * *

“Is it take your son to work day today?” Persephone asks when Nico takes a seat in an armchair that lets out an occasional groan or scream every so often. His father really ought to redecorate.

“Nico is joining us,” Hades says. Persephone looks at him in confusion before grinning.

“I think we should change the movie, then!”

Honestly, Nico has never seen his father look so happy. “Well, if you’re sure, dear. What did you have in mind?”

Persephone smiles widely at him and Nico has a funny feeling he knows where this is going. “What do you say to _Hercules,_ darling?”

Hades lets out a long suffering sigh. Persephone winks at Nico. They kind of got along, he thinks. Honestly Persephone was kind of cool, and she had, for some reason, taken it upon herself to get him caught up on the movies he had missed during his time in the casino. She had shown him Disney’s _Hercules_ a year or so again. Normally she turned it on when she was annoyed at Hades, but sometimes, like now, she just liked to poke fun.

“What do you say, Father? _Steel Magnolias_ or _Hercules?”_

Hades gives him such a vicious look that it would be scary if it wasn’t so hilarious.

“Put the blasted Disney movie in,” he tells Persephone sullenly. “And you,” he adds, in a whisper to Nico. “Propose to the damn boy if you need to, but fix this, and do it _soon.”_

Nico blushes, but Persephone and Hades take a seat as the movie starts, and soon enough Nico is laughing along with Persephone as his father complains.

“I don’t look like that,” he mutters angrily.

If there had ever been a better way to take his mind off his current situation, listening to his father exclaim loudly about the inaccuracies of the movie while Persephone giggled beside him was probably not what he would have initially thought of, but it works damn well.

* * *

He gets back to camp later that night, feeling… relaxed. The world must really be fucked up if spending time with his father was actually making him feel better.

“Look what the Furies dragged in,” he hears as he makes his way towards the campfire. Jason and Percy are sitting beside each other roasting marshmallows, and Piper and Annabeth are sitting across the fire; Annabeth keeps shooting Percy dirty glares. “How’s your father?”

“Old. Bitter. Sarcastic.”

“Just like his son.”

Nico kicks Percy half-heartedly and takes a seat beside Jason. Billy waves at him where the Hermes’ cabin is sitting, and Nico waves back.

“Where did he come from?” Jason asks, nodding at him. Nico shrugs.

“Found him in an alley cornered by a Cyclops.”

“He talks a lot,” Percy says. “Reminds me of a kid I used to know.”

“You’re particularly irritating tonight, Jackson,” he says. Percy slings an arm around him.

The campfire fizzles out and everyone heads to bed. Nico takes his light down, as per usual, and then climbs into bed, but twenty or odd minutes later he hears a light tap on the window above his bed. He sits up and opens the window and Will climbs in, gracefully dropping onto Nico’s bed.

“What are you doing?” He hisses. “You’re going to get eaten by harpies.”

“I just wanted to check on you.”

“Why? I’m fine, Solace.”

Will gives him a look. “Why did you go to the Underworld?”

He shrugs. “I wanted to see my father.”

“Yeah, that’s not exactly normal.”

Nico can’t help but laugh. “It’s fine, Will. I had a movie night with him and Persephone.”

“That’s the weirdest thing I think I’ve ever heard.”

“I’m fine, Solace. You worry too much.”

“It’s kind of my job.”

“Honestly. I’m fine.”

Will keeps looking at him, and it’s pretty damn awkward, really, because they’re in his bed, and they’re _really_ close, and they’re in _bed._ He can’t stress that enough – _bed._

“All right. I believe you.”

“That’s new.”

Will smiles. “I’m trying to be slightly less overbearing. Especially with you.”

Nico blinks. “Oh. Well. Thanks.”

Will shrugs, and he doesn’t meet Nico’s eyes. Nico picks at his comforter.

“I know I’m a little tough on you. I’m sorry about that. I know it bugs you.”

“Where is this coming from, Solace?”

“I dunno. I think just – when I found out you went to the Underworld I got really freaked and I realized that wasn’t fair to you. It’s not fair that I keep acting like you can’t take care of yourself just because you acted a little reckless when you were trying to save the world.”

“That was a group effort. We were all a little reckless. If I recall we got into a fight in the middle of the Roman army.”

Will laughs. “Oh yeah. Right. Well, anyway. I’m sorry that I always… underestimate you.”

Nico swallows audibly. “It’s all right, Solace. Thank you.”

Will grabs his hand and entwines their fingers. “That was all that I wanted to say.”

Nico takes a breath. Will is looking at him fondly, and Nico can’t quite look away. He wants to kiss him again, previous experience be damned.

Instead he clears his throat and shifts subtly away from Will. “Well. Thanks. You should go, though. It’s late. We’ll both get in shit if you’re caught.”

Will looks vaguely disappointed. “Yeah, you’re right. I just… wanted to make sure we were cool.”

“Course we’re cool, Solace.”

He smiles warmly at Nico as he climbs back out the window, and Nico lies back down, feeling more confused than ever. He didn’t think it was possible for him to feel more confused. He didn’t think there was room in his brain.

Shows how much he knew.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay i KNOW persephone shouldn't be down there technically bc it's summer but i don't.................care lmao work with me here okay


	12. Chapter 12

He wakes up to the same day, as usual, but he wakes up feeling determined. Something about spending time with his father and Will Solace in his bed has given him new drive to figure out what the fuck is going on, and to fix it. He’s tired of running in place.

The first thing he does that morning is go to see Annabeth. He knocks on the door on the Athena cabin until – lo and behold – Malcolm opens it.

“Oh. Hi, Nico.”

Nico leans back slightly. “I didn’t know you knew my name.”

Malcolm smiles. He is quite attractive. He has the same eyes as Annabeth. “Sure. You had that huge statue. Almost died. You’re dating Will Solace, aren’t you?”

Nico feels himself turning red. “Uh, no, I’m not – we’re not – me and Will aren’t dating.”

Malcolm shrugs. “Huh. You certainly act like it. Anyway, you want Annabeth, yeah?”

“Yeah,” he says awkwardly. Malcolm disappears, and Annabeth comes shortly after.

“Hey. What’s up?”

“I’m going to need your help tonight, but I’m going to need you to be on speaking terms with Percy, so when you go get Piper, can you just head straight to the dining hall?”

Annabeth narrows her eyes. “What are you talking about?”

“I’ll explain after Capture the Flag, okay? Promise.”

Annabeth purses her lips but eventually nods. “Okay. Sure.”

After that he heads back to Jason. They eat lunch, he excuses himself under the pretense of going to his cabin, and then he shadow jumps to the well-known alley once again. Billy is easier to convince, this time. He stares at him with his face screwed up, as if he can’t quite make him out, and then he says, “Have we met?”

That’s a loaded question. “No,” he says. But Billy doesn’t look convinced.

“I think I’ve seen you before,” he says. Nico doesn’t understand what the fuck it is about this kid, but he doesn’t need to give him his sword this time – Billy seems to accept that they know each other despite Nico’s protests, and that appears to convince him it’s safe to follow him. He brings him back to camp and takes him to meet Chiron, and then he goes to find everyone else to tell them he needs to talk to all of them after Capture the Flag. He takes guard duty with Billy again, who seems to somehow remember the rules – Nico really hopes that’s one mystery that gets solved at the end of this. After Nico heads back to his cabin, where Jason and Piper are waiting for him. Annabeth and Percy show up shortly after, and he even brings Leo, who doesn’t strictly know about him and Will, but who probably knows anyway, because apparently they’re not subtle.

“Okay. This is going to sound pretty weird, but we’ve all done some pretty weird shit, so just… remember that.” He takes a deep breath, and launches into his explanation. Honestly, he’s getting pretty sick and tired of explaining this over and over. Once again Jason glares at him when he gets to the part about running away but he pushes past that, refusing to meet his eyes. When he’s finished he takes a seat next to Jason and runs a hand over his face.

“Ho-ly shit,” Leo says, helpfully. Percy lets out a long whistle.

“She is out of control,” he says. “No offence, Piper.”

But Piper shakes her head. “I’m sorry, Nico. I’m sorry she’s doing this to you.”

“It’s not your fault, Piper.”

“Yeah, if we had to apologize for every shitty thing our parents did –”

“You would never stop, yeah, I know,” Nico interrupts. “I don’t know what else we could possibly do. It can’t be Solace. I tried to get over him with other people. Granted I didn’t put much of an effort in, but I did try. What the hell else could she possibly want from me?” Jason pats his back comfortingly as he drops his head in his hands.

There is silence. Everyone else is out of ideas. He’s definitely shit out of luck, if not even his friends can help anymore.

“I take it this silence means no one has any ideas?” He says miserably. Everyone shakes their heads, except for Piper.

“I think I might have an idea,” she says, although she looks like she’d rather not say it.

“Well, what is it?”

“And why do you look so miserable?”

Piper looks at him apologetically. “I can only think of one other thing she could possibly be interested in, but it’s… it’s mean. It’s mean and – but I can’t think of anything else.”

“Just tell me, Piper.”

She looks at him sadly, and then she glances across at Percy. “I think – well, it’s an option that maybe she wants you to – to kiss Percy.”

Nico opens his mouth to respond to this. Closes it. Opens it again. Closes it. Eventually he is able to remember what words are and he says, “No fucking way.”

“It’s the only other thing I could possibly see her being interested it.”

“For what _purpose?”_ He is very firmly not looking at Percy.

“Either because she wants to fuck with you, or… I don’t know, maybe she thinks you’re still… hung up, on him,” she says hesitantly. She is not looking at either of them, but is staring firmly at Jason’s knee. “Maybe she thinks that’s getting in the way.”

He stares at her incredulously. He fights to keep his voice calm; this is not Piper’s fault, after all. “How would that possibly be getting in the way? That was two years ago. I made a move on another guy, for fuck’s sake!”

“I know, Nico,” she says, placating. “I’m just telling you what I think could be an option.”

He really, really wants to kick something right now. He opens his mouth to say _fuck that,_ but Percy beats him to it.

“I’ll do it.”

Nico turns to him, jaw basically on the floor. “Excuse me?”

Percy shrugs, but despite his apparent nonchalance Nico can see that he is very red. “If it helps you escape this time loop. I’ll – I’ll kiss you. I’m fine with it.”

Nico can’t quite find words. Neither can anyone else, apparently, because silence greets Percy’s words. Leo is looking back and forth between the two of them as if he were watching a tennis match where nobody was doing anything.

“I mean – are you fine with it?” Percy asks Annabeth. Annabeth looks just as surprised as everyone else, but Percy’s words seem to snap her out of it.

“Yeah, of course. You really think that’s what your mother could want?”

Piper nods. “It’s the only other thing I can think of. Plus it combines one of the things my mother apparently loves – messing with Percy.”

“What does she think, he’s going to fall in love with me because of one kiss?”

Piper looks like each word she speaks is causing her pain. “She might just be trying to… give you the opportunity.”

He gapes at her. “But I don’t _want_ the opportunity!”

“I’ll try not to take that personally, dude.”

“I just,” he whirls around to Percy. “It’s not _like_ that anymore. You know it’s not like that anymore.”

Percy tries to give him a reassuring smile. “Its fine, Nico. I know.”

Nico sighs heavily. “I’m sorry,” he says.

“It’s not your fault.”

“You don’t have to do this.”

“I know.”

He hides his head in his hands again. Percy must give the others some kind of sign, because they all file out, leaving them behind. Percy lets him sit there for as long as he needs, for which he is greatly appreciative. Eventually he sighs and lifts his head. Percy is sitting with his back against the wall on Hazel’s bed, legs stretched out in front of him.

“You really don’t have to do this, Percy.”

Percy doesn’t quite look at him when he says, “I don’t think I’ve ever really apologized to you.”

“Apologized for what?” He asks, confused.

“For the way I treated you during the Titan war. You didn’t deserve it. I was unfair.”

“That was years ago, Percy.”

“Still. You were just a kid. A kid being manipulated by his father. And I was unforgiving. So I’m sorry.”

He swallows. “It’s okay.”

“No, it wasn’t. It’s time for me to make it up to you. To be a better friend.”

“Is that why you’re doing this? Because you feel obligated for what happened?”

“No. I’m doing this because you’re my friend.” He finally raises his eyes to meet Nico’s. “If there’s even a chance that it could fix things, it’s worth a shot, don’t you think?”

Cursing Aphrodite, he nods. “I guess.”

“Don’t worry. I’m a very good kisser.” It is a bad attempt at humour, and the slight quiver in Percy’s voice gives him away, but Nico appreciates it nonetheless.

Percy stands up and sits next to him. It’s strange – a few years ago this was all he had ever wanted. He had dreamed of this moment.

But now, with Percy in front of him, face close to his, breath on his face, he doesn’t want it. He doesn’t want Percy.

When Percy gently kisses him, it’s Will he is thinking of. Percy’s lips are softer than he would have thought, and his hand is holding his arm lightly. It’s not a long kiss, but it is intimate, and when Percy pulls away he laughs nervously.

“Do you think that worked?” He asks, moving away slightly. Nico is grateful for the space.

“If it did then you’re the best friend anyone could ask for. If it didn’t then this never happened, so it doesn’t matter anyway.”

Percy smiles at him. “Here’s hoping, dude.”

Percy leaves with an awkward little wave. Nico lies back down on his bed and buries his face in his pillow. “I can’t believe that just happened,” he says to the empty room.

Imagine – Percy kissing him! What a strange place in his life, when Percy Jackson would kiss him.

What an even stranger place when it would do absolutely nothing for him.

“I hope that’s enough for you, Aphrodite,” he mutters. “It had better be enough for you.”

* * *

That night at the campfire he sits next to Will. He can’t quite look at Percy without blushing, and the other boy is having the same problem. Part of Nico hopes the day does reset again, just so he and Percy can go back to normal.

“Hey,” Will says when he sits down.

“Hi,” he says, settling next to him. Will must sense that there’s something off about him, because he doesn’t say anything, doesn’t make any comments, no flirty jokes. He just sits down next to him, shoulders touching. It’s calm. Just what he needed. Nico leans back on his hands and closes his eyes, the comforting feeling of Will’s shoulder pressed up against his and soft humming in his ears.

* * *

He wakes up next morning and the first thing he does is check the lamp.

It’s back to normal.

He doesn’t know if he wants to throw things or cry, or if he wants to crash his room, or storm up to the Empire State Building and set fire to Mount Olympus. His emotions are spinning wildly out of control and he is stranded in the middle.

There’s only one thing left to do. He’s known for a while, but he had hoped that it wouldn’t come to that.

But when has anything in his life ever gone in his favour?

It’s time to talk to Will.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my poor emotionally stunted son i swear


	13. Chapter 13

“Sup, dude?”

It had been so long since he had heard that. He had almost missed it.

“Hi.”

Him and Jason make their way to breakfast, where Percy is sitting forlornly at the Poseidon table, eating his pancakes. He looks up when they sit down with him, nodding with his mouth full of food.

“Can I be on your team for Capture the Flag?” He asks once he’s swallowed. “Annabeth is angry at me.”

Nico rolls his eyes.

“What’d you do?” Jason asks in amusement. Nico tunes out this conversation, enjoying his breakfast while Percy and Jason prattle on. He is feeling weirdly hopeful, which is strange, since he has absolutely no reason to be. It just seems that this is what he’s supposed to do. He has to talk to Will. That will solve everything.

He’ll live this day as if it counts.

* * *

He makes his excuses as usual, shadow travelling to the alley he could probably find his way through with his eyes closed at this point. There’s the cyclops, big and hulking and angry, and there’s Billy, looking terrified, and Nico desperately hopes this is the last time either of them have to go through this.

He stabs the cyclops. Nothing fancy. No badass words. He doesn’t even try to be stealthy. He walks up to it and runs his sword through it and then tries to give Billy a reassuring smile.

Billy sighs. “I was afraid you weren’t going to show up.”

Gods, what the fuck was _up_ with this kid? He was starting to creep Nico out.

“What?”

“I just…” Billy stands up on shaky knees. “I thought you –” He looks around at them as if just realizing where he was. Then he looks back at Nico. “I thought I’ve seen you before,” he says. Nico swallows.

“You must have just dreamed it, kid.”

“Are you going to take me somewhere safe?”

“Yeah,” he says, wondering what the fuck any of this meant. “Yeah, I am.”

“What about my sister?”

He is talking to Nico as if they know each other – which they do, but only one of them is supposed to know that. It is eerie.

_Who is your mom, kid?_

“I’ll take you back here to look for her, okay?”

Billy nods happily, grabs Nico’s arm before Nico even tells him to, and they step into the shadows.

* * *

“Um.”

He waves at Jason and Percy, who look back at him in bemusement.

“Where did you find a kid?”

“I’m not a kid!” Billy shouts, far louder than was necessary. “I turn eleven next month!”

Percy raises his eyebrows. Then he looks at Nico.

“Shut up.”

“You don’t even know what I was going to say.”

“Yes I do, and shut up.”

Percy grins.

“Nico killed a monster! He just slashed him through with a huge sword! It was black and really big. Do you guys have swords?”

Jason’s eyebrows knit together. Percy shoots another glance at Nico.

“Shut _up,_ Percy.”

It isn’t until he is watching the Orientation video with Billy once again that he realizes he hadn’t told Billy his name this time.

* * *

Nico and Billy take guard duty again.

“Slow down,” he reminds Jason and Percy. “If you guys get their flag too quickly people are going to start getting mad and Chiron might limit what we can do.”

Percy points at him. “That’s why we keep you around.”

“Gee, thanks.”

The rest of the team disperses and Nico and Billy take their spots. It is quiet, which is his first clue that something is not right.

“What’s wrong, Billy?”

Billy is staring at the sword looking confused. “I just kind of… feel like I’ve done this before.”

Nico makes a decision then and there. “Do you want to know something no one else knows?”

Billy nods, eager.

“You have.”

He leans back a bit from Nico. “Are you making fun of me?”

He shakes his head. “Do you believe in magic?”

Billy looks around, then looks at the sword in his hand. “Yeah.”

“Well, I’ve been cursed. And I’ve had to live the same day – this day – over and over again. And I’ve met you before. And I’ve saved you from that cyclops before. And that’s why you knew my name today without me telling you. Because for some reason, you’re the only other mortal who has even some vague memories of what’s been happening.”

Billy stares at him with his jaw open. “Wait, really?”

Nico nods.

“How does it stop?”

“Well. I’m hoping I can stop it today.”

“Does that mean I’ll be able to stay?”

“Yeah. That’s the plan.”

Billy is about to say something when Nico hears movement. He stands up and draws his sword. Billy does the same – his helmet falls over his eyes rather comically.

Drew and Piper appear, Piper smiling at him warmly, Drew eyeing him with thinly veiled disgust.

“Di Angelo.”

“Hi, Drew. How nice to see you.”

Her lip curls. “We’re gonna take this flag, now.”

He laughs. “No offence, Drew, but you’re not going to take anything. I’m willing to bet Lou Ellen and Cecil are about to, however.”

Piper narrows her eyes at him. Nico sinks Drew – mostly just because he _really_ wants to – and then turns around, turning back to where the flag is. Lou Ellen and Cecil are frozen, staring at him, before Lou Ellen smiles.

“Well. Guess we’re evenly matched.”

“Solace is in the tree.”

Cecil makes an irritated noise. “How do you _know_ these things?”

Will drops down noiselessly. “I guess he can just sense me, huh Nico?” He says with a wink. “Our bond is that strong.”

Nico flushes and turns away. “Honestly, you can take the flag if you’d like. Jason and Percy are about to win.”

“You’re weirdly clairvoyant today, di Angelo.”

“Good word choice, Cecil, did you swallow a dictionary?”

Cecil flips Will off without taking his eyes off Nico. Nico just shrugs.

“Guess I just have faith in my friends.”

Lou Ellen narrows her eyes at him again, and he’s expecting her to launch into another tirade about the magic around him, when Billy gets going.

“Is that a bow and arrow? Do you know how to shoot? That’s so cool! Can you teach me? Who’s your parent?” Will opens his mouth – either to answer or ask Nico what the fuck is happening, he isn’t sure – but Billy keeps going. “Are you friends with Nico? He saved me! He says that he’s been –”

“OKAY, Billy, that’s enough,” Nico starts, and just then he is saved by the sound of a horn, and Lou Ellen lets out a string of curses, turning and stomping off. Cecil gives him a lazy wave and follows after her.

“Does that mean we won?”

Nico nods. Billy lets out a _whoop,_ and Nico decides not to point out that he didn’t actually do anything.

“EX-FUCKING-SCUSE ME?”

He turns around to see Piper tugging uselessly at Drew’s arm, trying to free her from her dirt prison. Next to him, Will makes a noise that sounds very much like he’s trying to stifle his laughter. Piper looks like she is having the same problem.

“DI ANGELO!”

He laughs and frees her. She scrambles out and gives him a glare that could scare the pants off his father. She opens her mouth, closes it, and storms off. Piper follows, after grinning widely at him, trying to calm her down.

“You are _so_ waking up with permanent makeup on tomorrow,” Will says. Nico shrugs. He would welcome permanent makeup if it meant he got to see tomorrow. “So are you going to tell me where you got this child from?” He nods at Billy, who has run off with Drew and Piper. Nico can distantly hear him asking questions about what permanent makeup meant.

“Found him in an alley. There was a cyclops attacking him.”

“And do I want to know why you were in a random alley in the city when you were supposed to be here all day?”

“That,” he says, “is an incredibly long story, Will.”

“What does that mean?” Will looks very distrustful. Nico nudges him lightly with his shoulder.

“It was nothing bad, honestly. I’ll tell you later. Hey, can you meet me after the campfire? I need to talk to you.”

“Uh. Sure. About what?”

“I’ll tell you tonight. I’m not dying or running away, so don’t give me that look.”

Will smiles. Nico is not surprised when his stomach does a complicated little flip. “All right. Sure. It’s a date. See you later,” he says, with a wave, seeming not to notice the look on Nico’s face.

Will Solace was going to be the fucking _death_ of him.

* * *

He sits with Jason and everyone else that night, because he knows if he stays with Will, he’ll be constantly bombarded with questions about what he needed to talk about. Leo launches himself into the fire again – honestly, if Nico never has to see that again, it will be too soon. Billy screams, everyone laughs, and then Billy starts raining questions on Leo, who looks around desperately for a saviour who never comes. Nico is in high spirits. For some reason he feels really good about this. He’ll talk to Will; he’ll ask him about what (hasn’t technically) happened, about how he felt, why he acted the way he did if he didn’t actually feel the same. Talking to Will had to be what fixed this. Instead of ignoring what happened and running away, he would face it head on. He wouldn’t let love get the better of him. That had to be what Aphrodite wanted. She _had_ to want him to talk to Will.

There is no other option. If this doesn’t work, he doesn’t know what he’ll do.

“Good luck!” Billy shouts at him as he heads back to the Hermes cabin. Nico appreciates the gesture, really, but he would have liked if Billy had maybe been a bit more discreet.

“Good luck with what?” Jason asks, looking at him funny.

“Nothing.”

“What do you need luck for?”

“ _Nothing,_ Jason. Gods, you’re nosy.”

“I’m not nosy. I just worry.”

So many people worry about him. He can’t believe he tried to leave again.

“Hey. I’m not like. Going anywhere. You know that, right?”

Jason shoots him a look. Then he smiles, wrapping an arm around Nico’s shoulders. “Yeah, I know.”

_I’m sorry,_ he tells him silently. _I understand now._ If he had gained anything out of this horrible experience, it’s that he had friends who would do anything for him. He knows that, now. He thinks about Annabeth’s graphing paper, Piper’s apologetic face when she told him her idea. Reyna’s hand on his, Percy’s lips on his – hell, even Leo helped, and Nico is pretty sure Leo is still kind of afraid of him.

And then there was Jason. Nico had never really sat back and thought about how lucky he was to have Jason Grace for a best friend. It was, after all, Jason he had gone to when he had finally snapped the first time. It was always Jason.

“Thanks.”

“For what?”

Nico shrugs, which is weird, considering Jason still has an arm around him. “Just, you know. Everything.”

Jason raises an eyebrow. “You’re acting weird.”

Nico scowls. “Can’t a person express their gratitude for their friends without people finding it suspicious?”

“Sure, but it’s _you.”_

“I take back everything I said.”

Jason laughs. “Are you sure you’re okay, Nico? Maybe you should go see the doctor.”

Nico jerks away. “I fucking hate you,” he says, as Jason laughs loudly.

“No you don’t,” Jason says when he’s stopped laughing, and as annoying as it is, Nico knows he’s right.


	14. Chapter 14

Will comes in through the window again.

“I have a door, you know. And it’s not even curfew, yet.”

“This is more fun. I feel like a spy, or something.”

“Why would you even want to be a spy?”

“I don’t know,” Will says, exasperated. “Jeez. You’re a buzzkill.” He drops down on his bed and sits, crossed legged, staring at Nico expectantly. “So? What is this whole thing about? Or did you just want to get me in your bed?” He winks again. He really wish Will would stop winking.

And this – it’s too much, honestly. All of this is too much. He doesn’t know what Aphrodite wants, if she wants him to get over Will, but if that’s what he’s supposed to do Will is making it _very, very difficult_ when he keeps saying shit like that. And okay, maybe he’s a little angry, too; he knows this is not Will’s fault, he was the one who tried to run away, but it’s frustrating to be led on like this, and maybe Will is a flirtatious person by nature but this was _too much for him._

“Why did you pull away when I tried to kiss you?”

Honestly he had had a better plan than this, to kind of ease Will into it, but fear and anger and hope and anticipation are all racing through his veins, and his adrenaline does not care about this previous plan.

Will’s eyes widen in confusion. “Wh-what? When you… when you _what?”_

Nico lets out a frustrated noise. “I have been living the same day for like, a week and a half, and all because I tried to kiss you and you ran away.”

Will is looking at him in complete confusion. “I’m going to need you to start over,” he says slowly. Nico runs a hand through his hair.

“I tried to run away from camp, again – don’t give me that face, Solace, let me finish this for fuck’s sakes – and on my way out I ran into Aphrodite, and Caerus, who’s the god of opportunity. They reset the day. It’s been July 22nd for over a week, now, and I’m the only one who can remember – well, me and my father, and kind of Billy, I don’t know why. Every day is the same, every day is Capture the Flag, every night is the campfire, and I can’t escape.”

Will looks horrified. “Gods,” he whispers. Nico takes a breath. His adrenaline is starting to fade, which means he’s starting to remember how afraid he had been to do this. He doesn’t particularly want to be rejected again. But he can’t exactly stop now, and nothing else has worked, and he’d be lying if he said he didn’t want to know, didn’t want to know why Will acted like he did when he didn’t actually feel the same about Nico.

“And the original day, the first July 22nd, I tried to kiss you after the campfire. And you rejected me. Which, fine, whatever. You don’t feel the same. But I tried to leave after that, and that’s what got me into this mess, and what I don’t understand is why you still… do this. With me. The hand holding and the winking and the flirting and the touching and I get if you’re not interested, Solace, but gods, please stop jerking me around.”

Will is staring at him with his eyes wide, his mouth open. He looks horrified and guilty. “Oh gods, Nico. I’m sorry.”

Nico rolls his eyes. “It wasn’t your fault, Solace, I’m the one –”

“No, no, it is my fault. You’ve – oh my _gods._ Shit. Shit. I fucked up. _Gods.”_

Nico watches as he stands up and starts to pace, wringing his hands.

“Would you tell me what the fuck you’re talking about?”

He turns back towards Nico, still looking wretched. “The reason I didn’t kiss you wasn’t because I don’t feel the same,” he says miserably.

“What do you mean?”

“Please don’t be mad at me,” he whispers.

“Tell me what the fuck you’re talking about, Solace!”

Will sits down on the other side of the bed and buries his head in his hands. “It had nothing to do with – I do feel the same. Obviously. I just – I had a… a plan.”

Nico doesn’t understand. “What do you mean, a plan?”

“A plan to… to ask you out. And I had spent a long time coming up with it and it was supposed to be really nice and romantic and I’m assuming the reason I didn’t kiss you back is because I didn’t want to spoil it but I… I was planning on doing it soon. I should have by now but I've been... nervous. I’m sorry,” he says again, looking up. Nico is stunned.

So Will felt the same. Will _wanted_ to kiss him, too, wanted to be with him in the same way. He hadn’t turned Nico down, he had just… postponed it.

He bursts out laughing.

Will looks at him as if he had grown two extra heads. Nico clutches his stomach, doubles over, tries to stifle the laughter in his blankets. He laughs until his stomach hurts. He laughs until he can’t breathe.

“Are you trying to fucking tell me that I have been reliving the same goddamn day for a week and a half, all because you were annoyed that I tried to make the first move?”

“Um.” Will swallows. “I guess.”

“Oh my gods,” he wheezes. “I have the worst life. I hate everything. This is the worst thing that has ever happened to me.”

“I’m sorry,” Will says again. Nico looks at him.

“You’re the worst thing that’s ever happened to me, Solace,” he says. Will throws a pillow at him.

“Hang the fuck on, none of this would have happened if you weren’t so damn jumpy! I can’t believe you tried to _leave_ again.”

“No, no, you don’t get to turn this back on me! I’ve lived the same day for a week and a half, I _learned_ my lesson, you aren’t allowed to lecture me, this is all on you, Solace.”

“Fifty-fifty blame.”

“Eighty-twenty.”

“Seventy-thirty.”

“Deal.”

Will grins at him. Nico shakes his head and laughs again. “So,” he says, giddy on the knowledge that for one, _Will liked him back,_ and for two, _he was probably going to see tomorrow._ “What was this masterful plan to seduce me? It had better be good, for the amount of shit I’ve lived through.”

“Whose fault is that,” Will mutters, the tips of his ears bright red.

“Seventy percent yours, we decided.”

Will rolls his eyes, but he is still smiling. “C’mon,” he says, holding out his hand. “You have to close your eyes, though.”

Nico narrows his eyes, but he takes the outstretched hand. “Fine. Lead the way.”

* * *

“Okay, you have to open your eyes now.”

He does, and looks around at his surroundings in confusion. “You planned to seduce me in my best friend’s cabin?”

“I planned to seduce you _on_ your best friend’s cabin,” Will replies, gesturing at the ladder. Nico sighs and makes his way up.

“I was going to have ice cream, but you kind of caught me off guard.”

“And how were you planning on getting ice cream?”

“I was going to bribe the Stoll’s,” he says. Nico rolls his eyes.

“Oh, of course.” But there is a very funny thing happening to his heart.

“Hang on, I’ll be right back,” Will says. Nico looks at him disbelievingly.

“Seriously?”

“You caught me off guard, I told you!”

“Fine, fine.”

Nico sighs and watches Will run off. They are getting dangerously close to curfew.

Will gets back a few minutes later with something in his hands. “Okay. I was way less embarrassed whenever I did this in my head.”

“What is that?”

Will can’t really meet his eyes when he says, “I learned how to play Mythomagic.”

A smile begins to curl at the edges of Nico’s mouth. “You _what?”_

Will shows him what he was holding. It is a box filled with cards. Nico tries to keep his cool, to not geek out in the way he _really, really_ wants to, but that fails rather quickly.

“How did you learn?” He asks excitedly, shuffling through the cards he has.

“They have instructions whenever you buy a pack,” he explains quietly. Nico grins widely and sits up, crossing his legs. When he looks up Will is looking at him fondly.

“Well, come on, Solace. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

Will is… all right. He understands the basics of it, but it isn’t like playing Frank, someone who understands the game instinctively, but Nico appreciates the gesture nonetheless.

He destroys him, but he appreciates the gesture nonetheless.

“Yeah, I figured you were gonna whip my ass, but the gesture was endearing and adorable, wasn’t it?” Will asks with a grin. Nico rolls his eyes.

“Yeah, Solace, that’s what I was thinking.”

Will laughs and then looks out at the rest of camp. “It’s later than I thought. We should probably get down before the harpies find us.” He sounds about as happy about this as Nico feels.

“Hang on,” he says. He concentrates on the shadows, gathers them, draws them around himself and Will, shrouding them in shadow. “There.”

“What did you do?”

“Manipulated the shadows. Harpies shouldn’t be able to see us, although they’d hear us if we’re too loud.”

He looks over to see Will staring at him. “What?”

Will shakes his head. “Sometimes I forget how powerful you are. I… I get jealous, sometimes.”

“You’re powerful too, Will.”

Will scoffs. “Damage control.”

“Damage control for a bunch of severely damaged demigods. I think that’s pretty important.”

“Eh,” he says, fluttering his hand. Silence settles over them, then. Nico leans back on his hands, and Will does the same, aligning their bodies from their feet to their hands.

“So tell me, Solace,” he says eventually. “What was your master plan after I kicked your ass at Mythomagic?”

Will is quiet for a bit before he grabs Nico – probably a little rougher than he had intended, but Nico will forgive him based on the fact that he’s probably about as nervous as Nico, which is to say, _really fucking nervous –_ and presses their lips together.

It is chaste and is shorter than his kiss with Percy. Will moves back, red as all hell, and looks at the sky, very firmly avoiding Nico’s eye.

“No offence,” Nico says, slowly. His heart might actually beat out of his chest. “But I’ve lived through a week and a half of utter hell, and that wasn’t really worth it –”

Will grabs him again, but this time he doesn’t let go, and when he kisses him he pulls him tight against him, cups a hand around Nico’s neck as he kisses him the way Nico has wanted him to kiss him for like, two fucking years. Nico threads a hand through Will’s hair and kisses him the way he’s wanted to for like, two fucking years. When they pull away Will is, somehow, even redder, and Nico is probably not far behind, and he can’t really quite believe that he just made out with Will Solace on top of Jason’s fucking cabin.

“Jason is going to be so annoyed when I tell him this,” he says.

“That was the first time I’ve ever done that,” Will tells him nervously. Nico opens his mouth to tell him not to worry, because it was the first time he had, too, when he stops and realizes that that isn’t true.

“That was… not the first time I did that,” he says quietly. Will gives him a look.

“Oh? You can’t have been that hung up on me, then.” But his voice is filled with amusement, and he doesn’t seem all that bothered about it.

“Well, uh – I kind of kissed Percy.”

Will leans back slightly. “I got to say, I was not expecting that.”

Nico rushes to explain, although again, Will doesn’t look that upset by this. Maybe because they had just made out on top of a roof. That would put anyone in a good mood.

“It was – yesterday, I think, or the day before, but, well, yesterday’s today, and Piper had said that was her last idea, that maybe Aphrodite wanted me to do that, because, well, there was those four years when Percy was – well, you know, I told you, that whole thing, and so Percy said he’d do it because it might break this whole fucking curse thing, and honestly I didn’t even _want_ to, and –”

Will kisses him again. It is a very efficient way of shutting him up.

“It’s fine, Nico,” he says against his lips. “Honestly.”

“If it makes you feel any better it didn’t technically happen,” he says. “A lot of things didn’t technically happen. I didn’t even try to kiss you the first time, if you think about it.”

“You talk a _lot.”_

“I’m sorry,” he says. No one had told Nico di Angelo that he talked too much since before his sister died. “I think I’m nervous.”

Will kisses him again. He’s really a big fan of this kissing thing.

“So what’s the verdict, di Angelo?” Will says when they pull away again. “Am I a better kisser than Percy Jackson?” His voice is light and teasing, his hand drawing circles on the back of Nico’s neck.

“I pretended it was you,” he says, very quietly. Will smiles at him, and it would be really, really fucking cliché to say that it’s like the sun, but it is.

They lie down, holding hands. Nico’s lips are tingling.

“I’m sorry this shit happened to you,” Will says. Nico shrugs.

“It wasn’t that bad.” This is a lie. It was horrid. But – well – it was worth it.

“Can I ask you a question?” Will asks. Nico nods. “Did you save that kid every day?”

“I didn’t meet him until the fifth or so, but after that, yeah.” When Will is silent he looks over at him. Will is looking at him with a smile on his face and something Nico can’t identify in his eyes. “What?”

“No, it’s just – you didn’t have to do that. It would have just reset, right?”

“Well, yeah, but he still would have _died._ It would have still hurt. And he could kind of remember it, I don’t know why. Why are you looking at me like that?”

“That’s just, like… probably the sweetest thing I’ve ever heard.”

Nico turns red and looks away. “Bite me.”

“No, I’m serious! Honestly I don’t know why you always try to act like you’re all moody and emo and shit, when really you’re the biggest sap I’ve ever met.”

“People keep calling me that, what the fuck does _emo_ even mean?”

Will laughs. “Oh right. You’re old.”

“Fuck off, I am not.”

“You are, you’re a sentimental old man who doesn’t know current slang and rescues children from monsters and it is –” Nico kisses him – “The cutest fucking thing –” Nico kisses him again – “I have ever fucking heard.”

“Have I ever told you that you’re the worst?”

“Once or twice, but I know you don’t mean it.”

“Don’t I?”

Will laughs and turns to his side, wrapping an arm around Nico. “Do you think this fixed the curse?”

“If it didn’t then I’m resurrecting Kronos and starting another war.”

“It’ll be pretty hard to fight a war in one day, don’t you think?”

“Now who’s the buzzkill?”

Will moves closer. “I’m sorry, even though I still maintain this was all your fault.” He tightens his grip on Nico’s waist. “You’re not still thinking of running away, are you?”

“No,” he says immediately. “I realized that I was being stupid and I had a place, here, and that even if you didn’t like me I had everyone else, Jason and everyone, and I mean, gods, Percy fucking _kissed_ me, if that’s not friendship I don’t know what is.”

“I can’t believe you thought I didn’t like you.”

“May I reiterate that you _turned me down?”_

“Sure, but only temporarily.”

“And how was I supposed to know that, smartass?”

Will laughs, which quickly turns into a yawn.

“Right. I forgot you’re pretty much solar powered.”

“M’not solar powered, dick. I’m just tired.”

“We should go back, then.”

Will shakes his head, his eyes closed. Nico sighs.

“Will –”

“No, no, listen, okay, this way, if it doesn’t work, no one will be the wiser –”

“Including you –”

“But if it does work we’ll know immediately.”

“And then we’ll get into massive shit.”

“Worth it though, don’t you think?”

Nico rolls his eyes. “You’re a bad influence, Solace.”

“Sorry. I should respect my elders, shouldn’t I?”

“Fuck –” Will kisses him, hovering over him, and Nico is aware of every line of his body, every place they’re touching, can feel his fingerprints searing into the skin of Nico’s neck, forever ingrained there, and if this isn’t enough for Aphrodite, he isn’t sure what is.

“I’m just saying it will be very awkward if Chiron finds us.”

“Horses can’t climb ladders. Besides, he’s _Greek.”_

“Yeah, so I’ve heard.”

Will smiles reassuringly. “Just explain what happened. Then everyone will be so taken aback that the world has stayed the same for the past week and a half that they’ll totally forget about us.”

Nico shakes his head. “We are so going to get in shit.”

“Yet you’re not moving.”

Nico rolls his eyes. “Shut up, Will.”

One more kiss, and then Will lies down again, using his arm as a pillow. “Here’s hoping a make out session is enough for the goddess of love.”

Nico listens to the breathing beside him even out, turning into a steady rhythm. His mind is going a million miles an hour, and there are so many things he needs to think about, and fucking hell, Will Solace is asleep next to him! There’s no way he’s going to be able to fall asleep.

He is asleep within ten minutes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ayyy they finally made out 
> 
> okay i don't know if any of you who read this happen to have left me prompts on my tumblr (@piedpipermclean) but if you are..... like i'm super sorry i know its been ages but school is getting heavy and the only reason i can even post this story is that it's done i've been so busy lately don't go to university kids 0/10 don't recommend


	15. Chapter 15

He wakes up to a very loud, very angry sounding clearing of the throat. He also wakes up to the sun bright in his face, and a really sore back.

Also, Jason is there, and he is flying, and his arms are crossed, and he looks _pissed._

“Are you kidding me right now?”

And it sinks in, rather quickly – he is still on top of the roof. Will is still beside him. _The day had changed._

“Will!” He shakes him. “Will! Will! It worked! Wake the fuck up, Solace, gods, your dad is the literal sun, get _up.”_

“Is anyone going to explain to me what the hell is going on?”

Nico looks back at Jason, and he is grinning, and honestly it kind of feels like he can fly, too.

“Jason – _gods._ Holy fuck. Hang on, I’ll explain, let me get down before Chiron sees.”

“I should report you,” Jason mutters as he lands.

“Chill out there, Mr. Praetor, and let me explain this.”

“I think I pretty much got the picture here, Nico.”

“No, you really don’t –”

“How did you know we were up there?” Will interjects to ask. He is holding Nico’s hand, which isn’t a new thing, but – _fucking hell._

“I went to try and get you this morning like I normally do and you weren’t there, and I checked with Percy and everyone, and then I checked the Apollo cabin, and guess who was _also_ missing?” He levels a glare at Will. “And then I remembered all the strange fucking noises I had heard last night, and I was right, and I can’t fucking believe that you were _making out on top of my cabin.”_

“How do you – we were not.”

“You might want to go see Drew about that huge mark blooming on your neck, there, di Angelo.”

Nico glares at Will, utterly mortified, but Will doesn’t look even remotely apologetic. But honestly, it doesn’t even last. He doesn’t care. He throws his arms around Jason and he almost wants to cry.

“Nico, what the _hell_ is happening here?”

And so he has to explain, again, giving Jason a quick rundown of everything that had happened, “And this is like the fourth time I’ve told you this but it _worked,_ I _fixed_ it –”

“ _I_ fixed it,” Will says.

“And gods, I never thought I would see this fucking day, this is my favourite day, holy shit.”

Jason looks slightly horrified at the story he had just been told. “Nico, holy – that’s – wow. I’m – wow. I’m still angry at you though!” He adds, although Nico can tell he doesn’t mean it.

They head to breakfast, and when they get there Billy comes bounding over.

“Did it work?” He asks, which is kind of a stupid question, since if it didn’t work he wouldn’t even be here, but Nico is too fucking happy to point this out.

“Yeah,” he says. Billy fist pumps the air, which is kind of weird, but who the fuck cared.

“Sweet! What did you do?”

“Um.” He exchanges a glance with Will, who looks just as reluctant to explain what had happened to a ten year old. “It’s kind of a – I’ll tell you when you’re older.”

Billy turns to Jason. “That means they kissed, right?”

Jason bursts out laughing while Nico sputters. “I like him,” Jason says. “Yeah, they kissed.”

“Who did?”

“Oh my gods, there is no privacy at this fucking camp,” Nico mutters, as Percy comes up and slings an arm around him and Jason. Will shoots him a look, and Nico knows what he’s thinking – technically there are two answers to that question.

He decides it will be much easier to get through this day if he explains to everyone collectively instead of to each person individually, so he tells Jason and Percy to get Piper and Annabeth, respectively, (“Uh – I’ll get Piper,” Percy had said), and he got Leo, and he brought them all back to his cabin, where he IM’d Hazel, instructing her to please get Reyna and Frank.

And then he explains. He skims over some details – he doesn’t mention the running away, this time, because Jason had given him enough disappointed looks about that to last him a lifetime, and now he knew that he was wrong, and that these people in front of him (Percy and Annabeth were across the room from each other) were his friends, and they had proved it a hundred times over.

“So Venus cursed you?” Reyna says disbelievingly. Piper groans.

“I’m sorry,” she says.

“It’s not your fault,” he reassures her.

“Yeah, Pipes,” Jason says. “If we had to apologize for every shitty things our parents did –”

“You would never stop, yes, I know, if I have to hear that one more time I might actually kill myself.” Jason grins at him.

“So how did you fix it?” Annabeth asks. “If none of the things you said we tried worked.”

Jason raises an eyebrow at him and sits back, a smirk on his face. “Yes, Nico, tell them how you fixed it.”

“It’s, you know… not really important, is it?”

“Nico and Will made out on top of my cabin.”

“ _Jason!”_

“You shouldn’t have used my cabin if you didn’t want people to know!”

Nico runs a hand over his face, embarrassed, but no one mocks him. If anything, they all look pretty happy for him.

“Hang on,” Percy interrupts. “If you could change things why couldn’t you have stopped me from pranking Annabeth by accident?”

“It is not Nico’s responsibility to stop you from being an idiot,” Annabeth hisses.

“Imagine all the work that would be.”

“I’m happy for you, Nico,” Piper says with a smile. “And for what it’s worth, I am sorry.”

“Jason and I are your official chaperones.”

Nico rolls his eyes. “Didn’t you and Annabeth get booked on the Argo II for the exact same thing?”

Percy doesn’t even have the decency to blush. “Yeah, but you’re still young.”

“I’m older than you for fuck’s sake –”

“You’re like a seventy year old virgin,” Percy says, realization dawning. Somewhere in the back of his mind Nico remembers that this is some kind of movie reference, and not just Percy being a dick.

Nico gives Annabeth a look. “Don’t feel too bad,” she says. “Percy is about to be a virgin for seventy years, too.”

“I said I was sorry! Annabeth!”

“Can we not talk about this?” Comes a voice, and Nico gestures at the IM, where Hazel is looking very uncomfortable.

“Yeah, you’re offending Hazel’s delicate sensibilities,” Leo says.

“I’m not delicate, Leo! I just don’t want to hear this about my brother.”

“Neither do I, if it makes you feel better,” Leo says with a wink at him. “So what have I been doing during all this?”

“You’ve thrown yourself in the fire like, seven times.”

Leo grins. “Never gets old.”

“No, it really, really does.”

“ _Anyway,”_ Piper says, and there is a hint of charmspeak in her voice, and Nico is immensely grateful. “Maybe we should all leave him alone for a bit. He’s gone through a lot.” Nico smiles at her thankfully, and everyone starts to disperse, but Nico says, “Hang on, Percy, can you… wait? For a second?”

He nods, shutting the door when everyone else has left. “What’s up?”

Nico takes a breath. “We tried a lot of things, over the days. Annabeth and Piper came up with a few ideas to try and stop it, and none of them worked, and then… the other day Piper had one last idea.” Percy looks confused as to why he’s being told this, but he listens patiently. “And it wasn’t one I wanted to do, and it was… well, I didn’t think it was even an option, but you –”

“Did I kiss you?”

Nico is simultaneously grateful that he didn’t have to say it but also embarrassed that it even had to be said at all.

“How did you know?”

“You’re like, really red right now,” he says with a laugh. “And Aphrodite likes to fuck with me. And it’s something I could see her doing.”

“Er, yeah. I just wanted to thank you. For doing that.”

Percy cocks his head. “Did I explain why?”

He nods. Percy looks relieved.

“Good. I was trying to figure out when to tell you that. Glad to hear I already did!”

“I don’t think it counts as a proper apology if you can’t remember.” He is immensely relieved that they are all right. He wasn’t sure if he should tell him, but he had decided that it wasn’t something he could just hide, and besides, he wanted to tell Percy how much it had meant to him, that he would even do that.

“Hey, I kind of went above and beyond normal apologizing!”

Nico rolls his eyes. “Can you, um…”

“Not tell anyone?”

“Yeah,” he says with relief. “You can tell Annabeth, if you want, but you’ll have to get her to talk to you, first.”

“Seriously, you couldn’t have stopped that?”

“I was a little fucking busy!”

Percy laughs and slings an arm around him as they leave the cabin.

* * *

Because it’s a camp filled with teenagers, the fact that Nico and Will had spent the night together spread through rather quickly. Chiron calls them both to the Big House and stares them down sternly.

“Can I just say you have no actual proof that this happened,” Nico says before he can start. Chiron gives him a very dry look.

“I am 3000 years old, Mr. di Angelo.” Oh, that was formal. “I will give you some leeway because of the situation you found yourself in but I will assign you both a chaperone if I find it necessary.”

“Percy and Jason already volunteered for that job,” Nico mutters. Will snorts.

Chiron gives them one last stare down before dismissing them. They manage to make it outside before they start laughing. Will grabs him and drags him to the side of the Big House, pushing him up against it and kissing him firmly.

“If Jason and Percy have to follow me around because you don’t know how to control yourself then I’m going to kill you,” he says, although he doesn’t exactly put a lot of effort in pushing Will off of him. Will just smiles against his lips and kisses him again and again.

* * *

That night at dinner, Billy gets claimed. He is eating beside Nico when something appears over his head, and the rest of the campers all fall silent.

“What is that?” Someone asks. Chiron goes over to inspect, and Billy seems to just notice that it’s _him_ everyone was looking at.

“Those are… all the signs of the muses,” a daughter of Apollo says. She’s right – it’s the symbols of the nine muses, all in a circle that is hovering above Billy’s head.

“How many mothers does he _have?”_ Leo says.

Nico starts laughing. Everyone turns to look at him. “Does that mean what I think it means?” He asks Chiron, who nods.

It is, appropriately, the Athena cabin who understands next.

“Mnemosyne,” Annabeth says.

“What does that mean?” Billy looks very uncomfortable. For someone who talks so much, he doesn’t seem all that thrilled to be the center of attention.

“She’s a – well, she’s a Titan. Is that allowed?”

“Obviously,” Chiron says, pointing to the undeniable proof that is Billy himself.

Billy tugs at his sleeve. “What does that mean?”

“Mnemosyne was the mother of the nine muses. She was also the goddess – well, the _Titan,_ I guess, of memory.”

His world was so goddamn complicated.

“That’s why you said you were getting vibes from him,” he shouts across to Will.

“I did?”

“Well, on one of the days, anyway. Mnemosyne was the mother of the muses. Art, poetry, all that fun stuff you’re really bad at.”

Will flips him off.

“Is that why I can remember things?” Billy whispers to him. “About you?”

Nico nods. “Yeah, it does.”

“So Alanna would be her daughter too, right?”

“Most likely, yeah.”

Billy looks down at the table. “Alanna isn’t coming back, is she?”

Nico sighs and wraps an arm around him.

* * *

There is something waiting for him on his bed, when he heads back to his cabin after dinner. When he sees what it is he rolls his eyes so hard they almost get stuck in the back of his head.

“Really?”

“I figured you might enjoy it.”

He turns around. His father is lounging against the wall.

It is a copy of Steel Magnolias.

“You fixed it, I see.”

“I’m going to assume that means _thank you.”_

His father shakes his head. “I’m thinking of a punishment for when Dolly Parton dies as we speak.”

Nico laughs. Then he thinks about what happened at dinner and he asks, “There’s a child here, a boy, he’s a son of Mnemosyne… he had a sister. Her name was Alanna. Is she…?”

Hades nods. “She is dead, yes.”

Nico slumps. “Shit.”

“Life as a demigod is not easy, Nico,” his father says, as if Nico didn’t already fucking know that. “That boy would be dead as well if it were not for you. Think of that, instead. And he will have you.”

He raises his eyebrows. “Did you read some kind of parenting book?”

Hades scowls. “One of these days you are going to be struck down for your sarcasm and you will deserve it.”

“Thanks, Father,” he says drily.

Hades sighs. “I am proud of you, Nico.”

“Literally all I did was make out with a dude. I dragged a statue across the world and almost died doing it and _this_ is what you’re proud of?”

Hades makes a face. “On that note,” he says. He puts a hand awkwardly on Nico’s shoulder before disappearing into shadows.

There is a knock on his door and Jason comes in. He is about to speak when he stops and stares at Nico’s bed.

“Why do you have a copy of Steel Magnolias?”

“You don’t want to know.”

Jason looks like he kind of does want to know, but he turns back to Nico. “I wanted to talk to you.”

“Okay.”

“Were you running away?”

He sighs. He doesn’t want to have this damn conversation again.

“Yes, but!” He says, because he doesn’t want to see that fucking face again. “I learned my lesson and we have had this conversation like, three times and I swear everything is sorted now. Promise.”

Jason looks like he wants to argue, but instead he just says, “You swear we’ve had this conversation before?”

“On the River Styx.”

“Okay. I just wanted to make sure –”

“I know, Jason.” Jason nods and turns to leave. “You were the first one I told, you know.”

Jason smiles widely. “I’m glad, Nico.”

* * *

That night, after curfew, Nico sets out again, except this time he doesn’t have a rucksack. He just sort of has a feeling.

Sure enough, Aphrodite is there. She looks very bright in the darkness of the forest. She grins when she sees him.

“Hello, Nico.”

“Hi,” he says.

“I’m so happy you figured it out! It wasn’t so bad, was it?”

“What would you have done if I never figured it out? Would you have stopped the world so one person could fall in love?”

“But see, that is the best thing about love, Nico di Angelo. It doesn’t matter that it is only between two people. It feels like the whole universe. Wasn’t it worth stopping the world for?”

He chews his lip. “It wasn’t fair to play with other people like that.”

“Have you ever heard the expression, all’s fair in love and war? You – all of you – have had so much of the latter. I thought it was time you got to experience the former.”

“So you stopped the world for one demigod?”

“No, Nico. You are still not understanding. I did not stop the world for one demigod. I stopped the world for you. I stopped the world for Will Solace. I stopped the world for Percy Jackson and Jason Grace and that poor orphan. I stopped it for your sister and for Reyna Ramirez Avila, not that she would be happy about it.” He smiles. “You are far more important than you understand. Love is far more important than you understand. It is fire, Nico di Angelo, and if you leave it untended it will burn down the forest.”

“I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

“You would think that two wars would have been enough to teach you how necessary you are, but they weren’t, apparently. Listen. I do not like you. And I know, although you are respectful and wise enough not to say it, that the feeling is mutual. But so many underestimate me. So many underestimate my children. Love can build up the world or it can tear it down, and you leaving this place would have started a domino effect that not even I can see the end of. Wars, and honour, and pride, and power, and all those things all the other gods fight for, they are all fine and dandy. But at the end of the day, who do you go home to?”

He swallows, suddenly very uncomfortable.

“You are not important enough to stop the world, but you are important enough to stop _their_ world. That’s what I wanted to show you. I had to play with time to do it, but like I said. I’ve been bored lately.”

“You said I would thank you, at the end of this.”

“I did. And you are, whether you know it or not. Every time somebody falls in love, they are thanking me, Nico di Angelo. Every kiss, every touch, every memory – those are all thanking me.”

“Will the gods leave me alone, now?”

“Probably not, no.” She gives him a wide smile. “But now, at least, you will have people beside you.”

He sighs.

“For the record, Drew did curse you with permanent makeup, but I ignored it. I figured you had been through enough.”

He looks up. “Thank you, Lady Aphrodite.”

Another smile. “I’ll take it. I would head back now. There is a certain someone waiting for you, and he might be thinking the worst.”

As he turns around and heads back there is a large flash of light. He squeezes his eyes shut.

Will is waiting in his cabin when he gets back. “Leaving already?”

“I didn’t pack anything, Solace.”

“I know. That’s why I didn’t wake up Jason.”

“Are you ever going to trust me?”

Will grabs his hand and drags him down beside him. “I do trust you. I promise. I wasn’t worried. I had a dream, someone told me to come here and wait for you.”

Nico shakes his head. “She really needs to mind her own business.”

“Aphrodite?”

He nods. “That’s where I went. Where I had met her the first time.”

“What did she say?”

“She started waxing poetic about love.”

“It is kind of her job description.”

“I think I understand what she was trying to tell me.”

“Oh? And?”

“She was trying to show me that I am not important enough to not be important.”

Will stares at him. “Excuse me?”

“I was trying to run away from love, not just… how I felt about you,” he blushes, aware that this is basically him admitting that he loves Will, “but from Jason, and Hazel, and Reyna, and everyone. She was trying to show me that I can’t.”

Will shakes his head. “I don’t really understand, but I’m not going to complain if it’s keeping you here.”

Nico leans forward and kisses him, Chiron’s warning utterly forgotten.

“Can I ask you a question?” Will says against his lips. Nico makes a noise in his throat that Will takes as a _yes._ “Why do you have a copy of Steel Magnolias?”

Nico just laughs and kisses him again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay percy jackson's greek heroes says titans can have demigod children all right I'M NOT MAKING THIS UP. also I couldn't find, like, a definitive symbol for mnemosyne so i used that one even though it's kind of complicated lmao idk man work with me  
> anyway!!!! we have arrived at the end thanks everyone for reading and your kudos/comments i appreciate it!!! i hope you liked it!! xo


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